A Rate-Adaptive MAC Protocol

for Multi-Hop Wireless Networks

Authors: Gavin Holland, Nitin Vaidya, and Paramvir Bahl

Student: Tran Thi Minh Khoa [2012221023]

Professor: Seung-Hyun Oh
Agenda
• Introduction
• Overview of IEEE 802.11
• The proposed Receiver-Based Autorate (RBAR) protocol
• Incorporation of RBAR into 802.11
• Simulation Environment
• Performance Evaluation
• Conclusion

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Introduction
- Rate Adaption

• Rate adaptation: is the process of dynamically switching data rates to

match the channel conditions, with the goal of selecting the rate that
will give the optimum throughput for the given channel conditions.
• Two aspects to rate adaptation:
• channel quality estimation: measuring the time-varying state of the
wireless channel for the purpose of generating predictions of future quality
• rate selection: using the channel quality predictions to select an
appropriate rate

• Important factor influences the effectiveness of rate adaptation: the

accuracy of the channel quality estimates. 3
Introduction
- Motivation

• Rate adaptation techniques have been designed for wireless local area network
• [19] R. Ramanathan and M. Steenstrup. “Hierarchically-organized, multihop
mobile wireless networks for quality-of-service support”
• Sender adapts the rate by using the feedback from the receiver
• [15] A. Kamerman and L. Monteban. “WaveLAN-I I: A high performance wireless
LAN for the unlicensed band”
• Sender selects the best rate based on information from previous data packet transmission
• [9] J. H. Gass, M. B . Pursley,H.B.Russell, R.J. Saulitis, C. S . Wilkins, and J . S.
Wysocarski. “Adaptive transmission protocols for frequency-hop radio networks”
• Select transmission settings (code rate, power level) based on cached per-link information
• New approach: rate selection and channel quality estimation are located on the
receiver, and rate selection is performed on a per-packet basic during the
RTS/CTS exchange.
• Rate selection can be improved by providing more timely and more complete channel
quality information.
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• Channel quality seen by receiver, the best information is available on the receiver
• Transmitting channel quality information to the sender can be costly
The Receiver-Based Autorate Protocol –
RBAR (1/2)
• Core idea: receiver select the appropriate rate for the data packet
during the RTS/CTS packet exchange
• Advantages:
• The channel quality estimation mechanism can directly access all of the
information made available to it by the receiving hardware for more
accurate rate selection.
• The channel quality estimates are nearer to the actual transmission
time of the data packet than in existing sender-based approaches.
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• Can be implemented into IEEE 802.11 with minor change.
 The Receiver-Based Autorate Protocol –
-Overhear
-Calculate
the
the rate
RBAR (2/2)
-Overhear RTS

rate &
RTS
-Calculate DDRTS
RTS using
using
& packet
packet size
size
in
in the
the RTS
RTS
-Update
-Update NAV
NAV : tentative reservation

: final reservation
-Choose
-Choose aa data
data rate
rate based
based on on
some
some heuristic
heuristic (most
(most recent
recent rate
rate that
that RSH
was
was successful
successful for
for transmission
transmission to
to the
the
Dst)
Dst)
-Store
-Store the
the rate
rate &
& size
size of
of data
data
packet
packet inin RTS
RTS
-Response
-Response to to the
the receipt
receipt of
of CTS
CTS
by
by transmitting
transmitting data
data packet
packet at
at
the
the rate
rate chosen
chosen by
by Dst
Dst

-Generate
-Generate an an estimate
estimate of
of the
the
conditions
conditions forfor the
the impending
impending
data
data packet
packet transmission
transmission
-Overhear
-Overhear CTS
CTS
-Select
-Select the
the appropriate
appropriate rate
rate
-Calculate
-Calculate DDCTS
CTS using
using
based
based onon that
that estimate
estimate 6
-Transmit
-Transmit itit &
& packet
packet size
size back
back the
the rate
rate &
& packet
packet size
size
to
to sender
sender in
in the
the RTS
RTS
-Update
-Update NAV
NAV
Incorporation of RBAR into 802.11 (1/3)
* IEEE 802.11 frame format:

BSSID: unique network identifier

FCS: frame check sequense

* Modifications to 802.11 frame for RBAR

1) Data frame

HCS

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Incorporation of RBAR into 802.11
(2/3)

2) RTS and CTS control frame

Rate & Rate &

Length Length

3) Physical layer header (PLCP)

IEEE802.11: PLCP header contain an 8 bit signal field to encode the rate
at which the payload of the physical frame should be transmitted.
*When physical layer has a packet to transmit:
1st: transmit the PLCP header at a fixed rate that is supported by all nodes
2nd: switch to the rate given in the signal field to receive the packet payload
(after verifying that the PLCP header is correct, using CRC)
end the transmission: determined by the receiver from the length field 8
Incorporation of RBAR into 802.11 (3/3)

RBAR: Physical layer switch rates twice during payload transmitting:

once for the reservation sub-header, and again for the remainder of the payload
 2 rate changes occur during transmission of the data packet
 Subdivide 8-bit signal field into two 4-bit subfields

Signal

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Simulation Environment (1/2)
• Autorate Fallback Algorithm (ARF), [15]
• If ACKs for 2 consecutive data packets are not received by the sender 
sender drop the transmission rate to the next LOWER data rate & starts a
timer.
• If 10 consecutive data packets are received  the transmission rate is
raised to the next HIGHER data rate & the timer is cancelled.
• If the timer expires, the transmission rate is raised as before, but with the
condition that if an ACK is not received for the very next packet  the rate
is lowered again & the timer is restarted.
• RBAR choose modulation scheme
(M1,…,MN) as following:
• M1 if SNR < θ1
• Mi if θi ≤ SNR < θi+1, i = 1,…,N-1
• MN otherwise
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Simulation Environment (2/2)
• Error Model: based on the detailed simulation of Rayleigh
fading channel, using the well known Jakes’ method [14]
• Network Configurations
• Configuration 1: consist of two identically configured nodes
communicating on a single channel. One node in fixed position,
other travels along a direct-line path to and from the fixed node
in a repetitious, oscillatory motion. The length of path is 300m.
• Configuration 2: consist of 20 nodes continuous motion within a
1500x300m arena

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Performance Evaluation (1/5)

• Overhead of the Reservation

Subheader:
• Configuration 1 with a single UDP
connection
• Packet size: 32, 256, 512, 1024,
1460
• Data: 8MBPS CBR source, data rate
for control packet 1Mbps fixed.

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Performance Evaluation (2/5)

• Slow Changing Channel Condition

• Configuration 1, mobile node
is moved in 5m increments
over the range of mobility
(0m-300m)
• 60s transmission of CBR data
over a single UDP conn.
• Data generated at rate 8Mbps, 13
sent in 1460byte packet
Performance Evaluation (3/5)
• Fast changing Channel Conditions
• Configuration 1, five different speeds (2,4,6,8, and 10m/s)

CBR connection TCP connection

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Performance Evaluation (4/5)
• Impact of Variable Traffic Sources
• Configuration 1
• Data generated at rate 8Mbps, sent in 1460byte packet
• Mean packet bursts ranging from about 1-2packets to about 20packets
• Traffic is generated for a single UDP connection across a Rayleigh fading
channel

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Performance Evaluation (5/5)
• Multi-Hop Performance
• Configuration 2, 15000x300 meter arena

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Conclusion
• Optimizing performance in wireless local area networks using
rate adaptation
• Propose new approach to rate adaptation, called RBAR
• Performances was compared to IEEE802.11 for mobile nodes
across Rayleigh fading channels
• RBAR consistently performed well

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Thank you!

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