Reliability modeling and prediction of Wireless Multi-Hop Networks with correlated shadowing

Shadowing losses on proximate wireless links have been experimentally proven to be highly correlated in various scenarios. However, most of the existing works on the reliability modeling of Wireless Multi-Hop Networks (WMHNs) assume independent link shadowing. Neglecting shadowing correlations could lead to inaccurate network simulation results and unreliable wireless system design. In this paper, we present a more realistic reliability model of WMHN that incorporates correlated link shadowing. In particular, we use the correlated shadowing model that was developed in our previous work. This model enables the efficient generation of spatially correlated shadowing. It has been proved to agree well with the literature in terms of statistical properties. The proposed network model allows us to predict the reliability metrics of WMHNs and study network designs that can lessen the effect of correlated shadowing. Numerical results indicate that it is important to use the correlated shadowing model when evaluating the reliability of densely deployed large-scale multi-hop networks. We also present some numerical results to show the influence of shadowing correlation on redundant node deployment. This paper makes a small but fundamental step towards reliable wireless multi-hop network design in the context of correlated link shadowing.