Route selection in IEEE 802.11 wireless mesh networks

This paper addresses the problem of route selection in IEEE 802.11 based Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs). Traditional routing protocols choose the shortest path between two routers. However, recent research reveals that there can be enormous differences between links in terms of quality (link loss ratio, interference, noise etc) and therefore selecting the shortest path (hop count metric) is a poor choice. We propose a novel routing metric—Expected Link Performance (ELP) metric for wireless mesh networks which takes into consideration multiple factors pertaining to quality (link loss ratio, link capacity and link interference) to select the best end-to-end route. Simulation based performance evaluation of ELP against contemporary routing metrics shows an improvement in terms of throughput and delay. Moreover, we propose an extension of the metric called ELP-Gateway Selection (ELP-GS) which is an extension meant for traffic specifically oriented towards the gateway nodes in the mesh network. We also propose a gateway discovery protocol which facilitates the dissemination of ELP-GS in the network. Simulation results for ELP-GS show substantial improvement in performance.     

Design and Performance Evaluation of IAR: Interference-Aware Routing Metric for Wireless Mesh Networks

Multihop wireless mesh networks are an attractive solution for providing last-mile connectivity. However, the shared nature of the transmission medium makes it challenging to fully exploit these networks. In an attempt to improve the radio resource utilization, several routing metrics have been specifically designed for wireless mesh networks. However none of these routing metrics efficiently tackles interference issues. Moreover, although some evaluations have been conducted to assess the performance of these metrics in some contrived scenarios, no overall comparison has been performed. The contributions of this paper are consequently twofold. First, we propose a new routing metric, Interference-Aware Routing metric (IAR), specifically designed for WMNs. IAR uses MAC-level information to measure the share of the channel that each link is able to utilize effectively. As a result, paths that exhibit the least interference will be selected to route the data traffic. Then we evaluate the performance of IAR against some of the most popular routing metrics currently used in wireless mesh networks: Hop Count, Blocking Metric, Expected Transmission Count (ETX), Expected Transmission Time (ETT), Modified ETX (mETX), Network Allocation Vector Count (NAVC) and Metric of Interference and Channel-Switching (MIC). We show under various simulation scenarios that IAR performs the best in terms of end-to-end delay and packet loss, and provides the fairest resource utilization.     

Routing metric of interference-aware link quality： an improved ETX in wireless mesh networks

This article addresses the problem of route selection in wireless mesh networks （WMNs）. The traditional routing metrics adopt packet delivery ratio （PDR） as a representative metric of wireless link quality assessment. However, PDR measured by the broadcast-based probe method is affected by the size, number and transmission rate of probe packets, which influences the metric accuracy. In this paper, improved expected transmission count （iETX）, a new routing metric of interference-aware link quality, is proposed for WMNs. Dispensing with traditional broadcast-based probing method, the iETX uses regional physical interference model to obtain PDR. Regional physical interference model is built upon the relationship between signal to interference plus noise ratio （SINR） and PDR, which contributes to the improvement of metric accuracy. The iETX comprehensively considers the effects of interference and link quality and minimizes the expected number of packet transmissions required for successful delivery, which helps find a path with minimum interference and high throughput. Simulation shows that the proposed metric can significantly improve the network performance.     

An adaptive load-aware routing algorithm for multi-interface wireless mesh networks

In wireless mesh networks, the number of gateway nodes are limited, when the nodes access to the internet by fixed gateway node, different requirements of nodes lead to the dataflow shows heterogeneity. Many new routing metrics and algorithms existing in traditional wired networks and the Ad Hoc network, can not be directly applied to wireless mesh networks, so how to design a routing metric and algorithm which can dynamically adapt to current networks topology and dataflow changes, avoid bottleneck node, and select the most stable and least congestion link to establish a route is very important. In this paper, we presented a new dynamic adaptive channel load-aware metric (LAM) to solve the link load imbalance caused by inter-flow and inner-flow interference, designed a self-adaptive dynamic load balancing on-demand routing algorithm through extending and improving AODV routing method with the LAM, to achieve flow balance, reduce the high packet loss ratio and latency because congestion and Packet retransmission, and can increase Network Throughput.     

Tandem Queue Models with Applications to QoS Routing in Multihop Wireless Networks

We consider the problem of quality of service (QoS) routing in multi-hop wireless networks where data are transmitted from a source node to a destination node via multiple hops. The routing component of a QoS-routing algorithm essentially involves the link and path metric calculation which depends on many factors such as the physical and link layer designs of the underlying wireless network, transmission errors due to channel fading and interference, etc. The task of link metric calculation basically requires us to solve a tandem queueing problem which is the focus of this paper. We present a unified tandem queue framework which is applicable for many different physical layer designs. We present both exact and approximated decomposition approaches. Using the queueing framework, we can derive different performance measures, namely, end-to-end loss rate, end-to-end average delay, and end-to-end delay distribution. The proposed decomposition approach is validated and some interesting insights into the system performance are highlighted. We then present how to use the decomposition queueing approach to calculate the link metric and incorporate this into the route discovery process of the QoS routing algorithm. The extension of the queueing and QoS routing framework to wireless networks with class-based queueing for QoS differentiation is also presented.     

An integrated routing and rate adaptation framework for multi-rate multi-hop wireless networks

In this paper, we propose a new integrated framework for joint routing and rate adaptation in multi-rate multi-hop wireless networks. Unlike many previous efforts, our framework considers several factors that affect end-to-end performance. Among these factors, the framework takes into account the effect of the relative positions of the links on a path when choosing the rates of operation and the importance of avoiding congested areas. The key element of our framework is a new comprehensive path metric that we call ETM (for expected transmission cost in multi-rate wireless networks). We analytically derive the ETM metric. We show that the ETM metric can be used to determine the best end-to-end path with a greedy routing approach. We also show that the metric can be used to dynamically select the best transmission rate for each link on the path via a dynamic programming approach. We implement the ETM-framework on an indoor wireless mesh network and compare its performance with that of frameworks based on the popular ETT and the recently proposed ETOP metrics. Our experiments demonstrate that the ETM-framework can yield throughput improvements of up to 253 and 368 % as compared with the ETT and ETOP frameworks.     

EPTR: expected path throughput based routing protocol for wireless mesh network

For effective routing in wireless mesh networks, we proposed a routing metric, expected path throughput (EPT), and a routing protocol, expected path throughput routing protocol (EPTR), to maximize the network throughput. The routing metric EPT is based on the estimated available bandwidth of the routing path, considering the link quality, the inter- and intra-flow interference and the path length. To calculate the EPT of a routing path, we first calculate the expected bandwidth of the link and the clique, and then consider the decay caused by the path length. Based on EPT, a distributed routing protocol EPTR is proposed, aiming to balance the network load and maximize the network throughput. Extensive simulations are conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed solution. The results show that the proposed EPTR can effectively balance the network load, achieve high network throughput, and out-perform the existing routing protocols with the routing metrics previously proposed for wireless mesh networks.     

EFT: a high throughput routing metric for IEEE 802.11s wireless mesh networks

In this paper, we present a throughput-maximizing routing metric, referred to as expected forwarding time (EFT), for IEEE 802.11s-based wireless mesh networks. Our study reveals that most of the existing routing metrics select the paths with minimum aggregate transmission time of a packet. However, we show by analyses that, due to the shared nature of the wireless medium, other factors, such as transmission time of the contending nodes and their densities and loads, also affect the performance of routing metrics. We therefore first identify the factors that hinder the forwarding time of a packet. Furthermore, we add a new dimension to our metric by introducing traffic priority into our routing metric design, which, to the best of our knowledge, is completely unaddressed by existing studies. We also show how EFT can be incorporated into the hybrid wireless mesh protocol (HWMP), the path selection protocol used in the IEEE 802.11s draft standard. Finally, we study the performance of EFT through simulations under different network scenarios. Simulation results show that EFT outperforms other routing metrics in terms of average network throughput, end-to-end delay, and packet loss rate.     

链路累积干扰（CIL）在无线Mesh网络中的应用

由于无线Mesh网络具有无线节点的静态性或半静态性以及共享无线媒介等特性,因此在无线Mesh网络中设计路由判据对网络的整体性能起着至关重要的作用。分析了现有的最小跳数（hop count）、期望传输次数（ETX）、加权累积ETT（WCETT）、MIC等4种路由判据,并指出它们的优缺点。最后提出了一种链路累积干扰（CIL）的路由判据方法,从理论上分析其优点,给出仿真结果。仿真结果说明,这种链路累积干扰路由判据能明显改善网络性能。     

A resource-efficient and scalable wireless mesh routing protocol

By binding logic addresses to the network topology, routing can be carried out without going through route discovery. This eliminates the initial route discovery latency, saves storage space otherwise needed for routing table, and reduces the communication overhead and energy consumption. In this paper, an adaptive block addressing (ABA) scheme is first introduced for logic address assignment as well as network auto-configuration purpose. The scheme takes into account the actual network topology and thus is fully topology-adaptive. Then a distributed link state (DLS) scheme is further proposed and put on top of the block addressing scheme to improve the quality of routes, in terms of hop count or other routing cost metrics used, robustness, and load balancing. The network topology reflected in logic addresses is used as a guideline to tell towards which direction (rather than next hop) a packet should be relayed. The next hop is derived from each relaying node’s local link state table. The routing scheme, named as topology-guided DLS (TDLS) as a whole, scales well with regard to various performance metrics. The ability of TDLS to provide multiple paths also precludes the need for explicit route repair, which is the most complicated part in many wireless routing protocols. While this paper targets low rate wireless mesh personal area networks (LR-WMPANs), including wireless mesh sensor networks (WMSNs), the TDLS itself is a general scheme and can be applied to other non-mobile wireless mesh networks.     

无线Mesh网中基于信道感知的多径路由判据

无线Mesh网是一种新型的宽带无线接入网络,其中路由算法的设计是一个非常活跃的研究领域。WCETT路由判据仅适于单径路由协议,但是多路径路由能够提供负载平衡和较高的总带宽。为了提高网络性能,在综合考虑无线链路质量和信道间干扰的基础上,提出了一种新的多径路由判据CAM-WCETT。仿真结果表明,该方案能显著提高网络的吞吐量。     

Multi-radio multi-channel routing metrics in IEEE 802.11s based wireless mesh networks

IEEE 802.11s is one of the emerging standards designed to build wireless mesh networks which may serve to extend the coverage of access networks. The default IEEE 802.11s path selection protocol Hybrid Wireless Mesh Protocol (HWMP) is based on the radio-aware airtime link metric (ALM) that outperforms the hop-count metric in single channel multi-hop wireless networks. However, this metric may lead to capacity degradation when multiple channels and/or multi-radio are used. To fully exploit the capacity gain of multiple channels use, new routing metrics have been proposed such as weighted cumulative expected transmission time, metric of interference and channel switching, interference aware routing metric, exclusive expected transmission time, and normalized bottleneck link capacity. These metrics distribute the data traffic load among channels and/or radios to reach the final destination. In this paper, we provide a qualitative comparison study that considers the characteristics of these metrics. Indeed, we substitute ALM by these different metrics, and we evaluate the performance of HWMP through simulation. Obtained results allow us to identify the appropriate use case of each metric.     

WMN中一种基于干扰感知的负载均衡路由协议

无线信道干扰和负载分布的不均衡严重影响无线Mesh网络吞吐量、端到端延时和资源利用率。在已有基于信噪比和邻居节点个数的干扰模型基础上,进一步研究了无线Mesh网络的链路干扰。在综合考虑了无线Mesh网络流间干扰和和流内干扰的基础上,提出路由判据PIL（Path Interfer-ence Level）。在此基础上,提出一种新的基于干扰感知的负载均衡路由协议IA-DSR（Interference-Aware DSR）。IA-DSR考虑无线网络拥塞并选择受到干扰最小的路径。仿真结果表明,在不显著增加开销的情况下,IA-DSR可以有效地提高网络的整体吞吐量,降低网络端到端时延和丢包率。     

Cross-Layer Design Based Optimized Link State Routing Protocol for Wireless Mesh Networks

A proactive routing protocol CL-OLSR (cross-layer based optimized link state routing) by using a brand-new routing metric CLM (cross-layer metric) is proposed. CL-OLSR takes into account four link quality impact factors in route calculation through the cross-layer operation mechanism: the node available bandwidth, the node load, the link delivery rate, and the link interference, and thus the effect of route selection is optimized greatly. The simulation results show that the proposed CL-OLSR protocol can not only improve the network throughput to a large extent, but also reduce the end-to-end delay, while achieving load balance route results.     

Distributed channel assignment combined with routing over multi-radio multi-channel wireless mesh networks

In order to realize the reduction of equipment cost and the demand of higher capacity,wireless mesh network(WMN) router devices usually have several interfaces and work on multi-channels.Jointing channel allocation,interface assignment and routing can efficiently improve the network capacity.This paper presents an efficient channel assignment scheme combined with the multi-radio link quality source routing(MR-LQSR) protocol,which is called channel assignment with MR-LQSR(CA-LQSR).In this scheme,a physical interference model is established:calculated transmission time(CTT) is proposed as the metric of channel assignment,which can reflect the real network environment and channel interference best,and enhanced weighted cumulative expected transmission time(EWCETT) is proposed as the routing metric,which preserves load balancing and bandwidth of links.Meantime,the expression of EWCETT contains the value of CTT,thus the total cost time of channel assignment and routing can be reduced.Simulation results show that our method has advantage of higher throughput,lower end-to-end time delay,and less network cost over some other existing methods.     

A ring-based multicast routing topology with QoS support in wireless mesh networks

Wireless mesh networking (WMN) is an emerging technology for future broadband wireless access. The proliferation of the mobile computing devices that are equipped with cameras and ad hoc communication mode creates the possibility of exchanging real-time data between mobile users in wireless mesh networks. In this paper, we argue for a ring-based multicast routing topology with support from infrastructure nodes for group communications in WMNs. We study the performance of multicast communication over a ring routing topology when 802.11 with RTS/CTS scheme is used at the MAC layer to enable reliable multicast services in WMNs. We propose an algorithm to enhance the IP multicast routing on the ring topology. We show that when mesh routers on a ring topology support group communications by employing our proposed algorithms, a significant performance enhancement is realized. We analytically compute the end-to-end delay on a ring multicast routing topology. Our results show that the end-to-end delay is reduced about 33 %, and the capacity of multicast network (i.e., maximum group size that the ring can serve with QoS guarantees) is increased about 50 % as compared to conventional schemes. We also use our analytical results to develop heuristic algorithms for constructing an efficient ring-based multicast routing topology with QoS guarantees. The proposed algorithms take into account all possible traffic interference when constructing the multicast ring topology. Thus, the constructed ring topology provides QoS guarantees for the multicast traffic and minimizes the cost of group communications in WMNs.     

基于无线Mesh网络的干扰感知型路由判据

在无线Mesh网络路由判据的研究中,最小跳数、ETX、ETT等路由判据没有考虑到无线网络中的干扰问题,据此选出的一般不是最佳路由。因此,基于它们的路由协议会对整个无线Mesh网络的延时、丢包率、吞吐量等性能产生较大影响。干扰感知型路由判据的提出对无线Mesh网络性能的提升起到了一定的作用。     

Design and implementation of CLASS: A Cross-Layer ASSociation scheme for wireless mesh networks

This paper focuses on the design and implementation of CLASS, a Cross-Layer Association scheme for IEEE 802.11-based multi-hop wireless mesh networks. The widely-used association strategy in traditional IEEE 802.11 wireless LANs allows a Mobile Station (MS) to scan wireless access links and then associate with the Access Point (AP) that has the best Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) value. Unlike traditional wireless LANs, IEEE 802.11-based wireless mesh networks consist of a multi-hop wireless backhaul. As such, the performance experienced by an MS after association with a specific Mesh Access Point (MAP) depends heavily on the conditions of both the access link (e.g., traffic load of associated stations, the frame error rate between an MS and an MAP) and the mesh backhaul (e.g., end-to-end latency and asymmetric uplink/downlink transportation costs). That is, selecting the MAP that yields the “best” performance depends on several factors and cannot be determined solely on the RSSI of the MS-MAP access link. CLASS uses an end-to-end airtime cost metric to determine the MAP to which an MS should associate. The airtime cost metric is based on the IEEE 802.11s, and comprises the access link airtime cost and the backhaul airtime cost. The proposed association scheme considers the frame error rate for various packet sizes, the available bandwidth on the access link after the association of the new MS, and the asymmetric uplink and downlink transportation costs on the backhaul. All experimental results are based on actual Linux-base testbed implementation. We also implement a general Cross-Layer Service Middleware (CLSM) module that is used to monitor network conditions and gather relevant metrics and factor values. Experimental results show that the proposed association scheme is able to identify the MAP which yields the highest end-to-end network performance for the mobile stations after their associations.     

一种用于混合通信网机会式路由选择算法

传统的路由协议都是针对特定的有线或无线网络,仅仅考虑路由的建立过程、路由建立过程中的收敛速度、路由维护的网络开销及路由动态更新时环路的避免等性能。将其用于有线无线混合传输网络会导致较低系统性能。机会式路由选择算法综合分析了无线链路状态和网络时延的影响,得出了各路径优先级的计算表达式,在路由选择时根据各条路径的优先级来选择路由。仿真结果表明,与传统路由算法相比较,该算法能够提高系统吞吐量和减少系统传输时延。     

Power-conserving routing of ad hoc mobile wireless networks based on entropy-constrained algorithms

This paper presents an approach to power-conserving routing of ad hoc mobile wireless networks. This approach relies on entropy-constrained routing algorithms, which were developed by utilizing the information-theoretic concept of the entropy to gradually reduce the uncertainty associated with route discovery through a deterministic annealing process. Entropy-constrained routing algorithms were tested using a single performance metric related to the distance between the nodes and to the power consumption associated with packet transmission. This paper also expands the versatility of entropy-constrained routing algorithms by making them capable of discovering routes based on multiple performance metrics. In this study, the second performance metric employed for route discovery relied on the power availability in the nodes of the network. The proposed routing approach was evaluated in terms of the power consumption associated with the routing of packets over an ad hoc mobile network in a variety of operating conditions.