In this paper, we propose a novel multichannel network with infrastructure support, which is called an MC-IS network, that has not been studied in the literature. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to study such an MC-IS network. Our proposed MC-IS network has a number of advantages over three existing conventional networks: a single-channel wireless ad hoc network (called an SC-AH network), a multichannel wireless ad hoc network (called an MC-AH network), and a single-channel network with infrastructure support (called an SC-IS network). In particular, the network capacity of our proposed MC-IS network is @math times higher than that of an SC-AH network and an MC-AH network and the same as that of an SC-IS network, where @math is the number of nodes in the network. The average delay of our MC-IS network is @math times lower than that of an SC-AH network and an MC-AH network and @math times lower than the average delay of an SC-IS network, where @math and @math denote the number of channels dedicated for infrastructure communications and the number of interfaces mounted at each infrastructure node, respectively. Our analysis on an MC-IS network equipped with omnidirectional antennas has been extended to an MC-IS network equipped with directional antennas only, which are named as an MC-IS-DA network. We show that an MC-IS-DA network has an even lower delay of @math compared with an SC-IS network and our MC-IS network. For example, when @math and @math , an MC-IS-DA can further reduce the delay by 24 times lower than that of an MC-IS network and by 288 times lower than that of an SC-IS network.
In conventional Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs), multihop relays are performed in the backbone comprising of interconnected Mesh Routers (MRs) and this causes capacity degradation. This paper proposes a hybrid WMN architecture that the backbone is able to utilize random connections to Access Points (APs) of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN). In such a proposed hierarchal architecture, capacity enhancement can be achieved by letting the traffic take advantage of the wired connections through APs. Theoretical analysis has been conducted for the asymptotic capacity of three-tier hybrid WMN, where per-MR capacity in the backbone is first derived and per-MC capacity is then obtained. Besides related to the number of MR cells as a conventional WMN, the analytical results reveal that the asymptotic capacity of a hybrid WMN is also strongly affected by the number of cells having AP connections, the ratio of access link bandwidth to backbone link bandwidth, etc. Appropriate configuration of the network can drastically improve the network capacity in our proposed network architecture. It also shows that the traffic balance among the MRs with AP access is very important to have a tighter asymptotic capacity bound. The results and conclusions justify the perspective of having such a hybrid WMN utilizing widely deployed WLANs. This paper studies the asymptotic throughput capacity of a random infrastructure wireless mesh network (RndInfWMN). Generally an infrastructure wireless mesh network (InfWMN) comprises mesh clients, routers, gateways and has hierarchical structures. An InfWMN can be divided into two categories, which are arbitrary InfWMN (ArbInfWMN) and random InfWMN (RndInfWMN). In an ArbInfWMN, the locations of the WMRs are arbitrary while in an RndInfWMN, WMRs are distributed randomly. The latter is more interesting when randomly distributed WLANs are desired to be connected through a wired network of gateways. There are some analytical research on the asymptotic capacity of ArbInfWMN where the number of interfaces per-infrastructure node, m, is at the same order of the number of available channels for the network, c, i.e. cm=@q(1). In our previous research, we investigated the asymptotic throughput capacity of ArbInfWMNs for a more general case in which cm=O(1). However, to date, analytical facility has been limited by the absence of analysis in RndInfWMNs, especially for the general case in which cm=O(1). In this paper, we carry out an original analysis of the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity of multi-channel multi-interface RndInfWMNs for the case in which cm=O(1). Our analysis shows that by identifying cm in different scaling regimes, the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity of multi-channel multi-interface RndInfWMNs exhibits different bounds, depending on the ratio between c and m. Wireless mesh networks (WMNs) consist of mesh routers and mesh clients, where mesh routers have minimal mobility and form the backbone of WMNs. They provide network access for both mesh and conventional clients. The integration of WMNs with other networks such as the Internet, cellular, IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.15, IEEE 802.16, sensor networks, etc., can be accomplished through the gateway and bridging functions in the mesh routers. Mesh clients can be either stationary or mobile, and can form a client mesh network among themselves and with mesh routers. WMNs are anticipated to resolve the limitations and to significantly improve the performance of ad hoc networks, wireless local area networks (WLANs), wireless personal area networks (WPANs), and wireless metropolitan area networks (WMANs). They are undergoing rapid progress and inspiring numerous deployments. WMNs will deliver wireless services for a large variety of applications in personal, local, campus, and metropolitan areas. Despite recent advances in wireless mesh networking, many research challenges remain in all protocol layers. This paper presents a detailed study on recent advances and open research issues in WMNs. System architectures and applications of WMNs are described, followed by discussing the critical factors influencing protocol design. Theoretical network capacity and the state-of-the-art protocols for WMNs are explored with an objective to point out a number of open research issues. Finally, testbeds, industrial practice, and current standard activities related to WMNs are highlighted. Research into the analytical solutions for the capacity of the infrastructure wireless mesh networks (InfWMN) is highly interesting. An InfWMN is a hierarchical network consisting of mesh clients, mesh routers and gateways. The mesh routers form a wireless mesh infrastructure to which the mesh clients are connected through the use of star topology. The previous analytical solutions have only investigated the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity of either single-channel InfWMNs or multi-channel InfWMNs under conditions in which each infrastructure node (i.e. wireless routers and gateways), has a dedicated interface per-channel. The results of previous analytical studies show that there are quite few studies that have addressed the more practical cases where the number of interfaces per-node is less than the number of channels. In this paper, we derive an original analysis of the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity of multi-channel InfWMNs in which the number of interfaces per-infrastructure node, denoted by m, is less than or equal to the number of channels, denoted by c. Our analysis reveals that the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity of multi-channel InfWMNs has different bounds, which depend on the ratio between c and m. In addition, in the case that m < c, there is a reduction in the capacity of the InfWMN compared to the case in which c = m. Our analytical solutions also prove that when ( c m = ( N _g^2 N _ r ) ), where Ng and Nr denote the number of gateways and mesh routers respectively, gateways cannot effectively increase the throughput capacity of the multi-channel InfWMNs. Next generation fixed wireless broadband networks are being increasingly deployed as mesh networks in order to provide and extend access to the internet. These networks are characterized by the use of multiple orthogonal channels and nodes with the ability to simultaneously communicate with many neighbors using multiple radios (interfaces) over orthogonal channels. Networks based on the IEEE 802.11a b g and 802.16 standards are examples of these systems. However, due to the limited number of available orthogonal channels, interference is still a factor in such networks. In this paper, we propose a network model that captures the key practical aspects of such systems and characterize the constraints binding their behavior. We provide necessary conditions to verify the feasibility of rate vectors in these networks, and use them to derive upper bounds on the capacity in terms of achievable throughput, using a fast primal-dual algorithm. We then develop two link channel assignment schemes, one static and the other dynamic, in order to derive lower bounds on the achievable throughput. We demonstrate through simulations that the dynamic link channel assignment scheme performs close to optimal on the average, while the static link channel assignment algorithm also performs very well. The methods proposed in this paper can be a valuable tool for network designers in planning network deployment and for optimizing different performance objectives. An infrastructure wireless mesh network (WMN) is a hierarchical network consisting of mesh clients, mesh routers and gateways. Mesh routers constitute a wireless mesh backbone, to which mesh clients are connected as a star topology, and gateways are chosen among mesh routers providing Internet access. In this paper, the throughput capacity of infrastructure WMNs is studied. For such a network with Nc randomly distributed mesh clients, Nr regularly placed mesh routers and Ng gateways, assuming that each mesh router can transmit at W bits s, the per-client throughput capacity has been derived as a function of Nc , Nr , Ng and W . The result illustrates that, in order to achieve high capacity performance, the number of mesh routers and the number of gateways must be properly chosen. It also reveals that an infrastructure WMN can achieve the same asymptotic throughput capacity as that of a hybrid ad hoc network by choosing only a small number of mesh routers as gateways. This property makes WMNs a very promising solution for future wireless networking. In this paper, we study the asymptotic throughput capacity of a static multi-channel multi-interface infrastructure wireless mesh network (InfWMN) wherein each infrastructure node has m interfaces and c channels of unequal bandwidth are available. First, an upper bound on the InfWMN per-user capacity is established. Then, the feasible lower bound is derived by construction. We prove that both lower and upper bounds are tight. We limit our analysis for more practical case of @math . However, for the asymptotic upper bound, our analysis can be used for the general case in which there is no constraint on m and c. Our study shows that in such a network with Nc randomly distributed mesh clients, Nr regularly placed mesh routers, and Ng gateways, the asymptotic per-client throughput capacity has different bounds, which depend on the ratio between the total available bandwidth for the network and the sum of m first greatest data rates of c available channels, i.e., @math . The results of this paper are more general compared to the existing published researches. In addition, in the case that @math , our results reduce to the previously reported studies. This implies that our study is comprehensive compared to the formerly published researches. Compared to single-hop networks such as WiFi, multihop infrastructure wireless mesh networks (WMNs) can potentially embrace the broadcast benefits of a wireless medium in a more flexible manner. Rather than being point-to-point, links in the WMNs may originate from a single node and reach more than one other node. Nodes located farther than a one-hop distance and overhearing such transmissions may opportunistically help relay packets for previous hops. This phenomenon is called opportunistic overhearing listening. With multiple radios, a node can also improve its capacity by transmitting over multiple radios simultaneously using orthogonal channels. Capitalizing on these potential advantages requires effective routing and efficient mapping of channels to radios (channel assignment (CA)). While efficient channel assignment can greatly reduce interference from nearby transmitters, effective routing can potentially relieve congestion on paths to the infrastructure. Routing, however, requires that only packets pertaining to a particular connection be routed on a predetermined route. Random network coding (RNC) breaks this constraint by allowing nodes to randomly mix packets overheard so far before forwarding. A relay node thus only needs to know how many packets, and not which packets, it should send. We mathematically formulate the joint problem of random network coding, channel assignment, and broadcast link scheduling, taking into account opportunistic overhearing, the interference constraints, the coding constraints, the number of orthogonal channels, the number of radios per node, and fairness among unicast connections. Based on this formulation, we develop a suboptimal, auction-based solution for overall network throughput optimization. Performance evaluation results show that our algorithm can effectively exploit multiple radios and channels and can cope with fairness issues arising from auctions. Our algorithm also shows promising gains over traditional routing solutions in which various channel assignment strategies are used.