A weighted interference estimation scheme for interface switching wireless mesh networks

The number of available channels in a specific wireless network is bounded. Therefore, co-channel interference is inevitable in most wireless networks. The co-channel interference problem in wireless mesh networks is more serious than that in single-hop wireless networks. It is preferable for mesh nodes to dynamically adjust channels to elevate the interference level of networks. In this paper, we introduce the conception of communication constraint to denote the strategies that decide the mode of interface switching. We develop an interference estimation scheme. The proposed scheme uses a weight to represent the effects of loads distribution and relative distance between nodes on the interference level of network. We compare the performance of our solution with the model presented by Gupta and Kumar [14] through both graph-based and NS2 simulations. Extensive results show that our solution achieves better performance than the compared scheme when the number of available channels is small.