A fully-distributed control time slot assignment protocol for large wireless mesh networks

A control time slot assignment protocol is developed for time division multiple access (TDMA) and time division duplex (TDD)-based large wireless mesh networks (WMNs). Through the protocol, each wireless mesh router acquires a broadcast time slot that supports a minimum average signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) to all of its neighbors. The protocol employs contention-based reservation mechanisms in a topology-dependent way and executes in a fully-distributed manner. It explicitly takes into account vagaries of radio propagation and co-channel interference, often oversimplified in the literature. A computer simulator is created that implements realistic large-scale radio propagation and considers all co-channel interferers in the network. Through simulations, protocol performance is determined for different wireless system factors including shadowing. In addition, a power control scheme is proposed to better utilize time slots. Results show that the protocol indeed guarantees a minimum average SINR for all links between a pair of neighbors in all simulated scenarios.