A Simple and Effective QoS Differentiation Scheme in IEEE 802.16 WiMAX Mesh Networking

Due to the inherent flexibility, scalability and reliability advantages of mesh networking architecture, the IEEE 802.16 working group is actively standardizing the mesh mode. Compared with the point-to-multipoint (PMP) mode, the newly introduced mesh mode has not specified any solution for providing quality-of-service (QoS) mechanisms in the literature. In this paper, a simple and effective scheme achieving QoS differentiation in the WiMAX mesh networking mode was proposed and analyzed. In addition, by taking account into the dynamics of networks topologies and also the variations of different protocols, a characteristics matrix for a mesh network from stochastic point of view was introduced. Based on the matrix, a new formula was developed for the performance metrics which enables the theoretical evaluation of a random topology. Illustrative numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed strategy, and also the impacts of the key parameters in differentiating the various services.