Joint optimization of physical layer parameters and routing in wireless mesh networks

Abstract

Achieving the best performance in a wireless mesh network requires striking the right balance between the performance of links carrying traffic and the extent of spatial reuse of the wireless medium. The performance of a link depends on its transmit power and data rate as well as the level of interference caused by concurrent transmissions in the network; the latter is function of the Energy Detect (ED) threshold that determines when a node may access the medium. Which links in the network carry traffic is determined by the routing function; routing selects paths according to a link metric that reflects the relative performance of links (e.g., the expected transmission time of a packet on the link). In this paper, we seek to maximize end-to-end network throughput by jointly optimizing physical layer parameters and routing. We consider a random topology with a uniform node density. We consider that the signal attenuation between a pair of nodes is determined by a power law path loss model with an exponent equal to 3. Our findings are as follows. Consider first that the same transmit power and same data rate are used on all links. For any transmit power, data rate and ED threshold setting, the highest feasible load is obtained when the level of interference experienced by links used by routing is the highest possible. For a given transmit power and data rate setting, there is an optimum ED threshold that maximizes network performance. At the optimum ED threshold and maximum load, the range of link lengths used by routing is the lowest possible given the topology and routing metric used. With an ED threshold higher than the optimum, the same range of links is used by routing; however, the highest feasible load in this case is lower due to the fact that concurrent transmitters are allowed to be closer. With a lower ED threshold, concurrent transmitters are forced to be farther apart, and thus longer links become more attractive; as a result, the range of link lengths used by routing is higher. Among all data rates, one particular data rate results in the best network performance at the corresponding optimum ED threshold. Finally, we find that adjusting the transmit power downwards for shorter links results in an improvement of about 15%, while adjusting the data rate upward on shorter links results in a rather modest improvement. ©2010 IEEE.