Modeling the IEEE 802.11 Networks MAC Layer Using Diffusion Approximation | Institute of Theoretical and Applied Informatics, Polish Academy of Sciences

Title	Modeling the IEEE 802.11 Networks MAC Layer Using Diffusion Approximation
Publication Type	Conference Paper
Year of Publication	2010
Authors	Czachórski T, Grochla K, Nycz T., Pekergin F
Editor	Czachórski T
Conference Name	Proceeding of HET-NETs 2010
Date Published	1
Publisher	Institute of Theoretical and Applied Informatics of the Polish Academy of Sciences
Conference Location	Gliwice, Bałtycka 5
Abstract	Abstract: The article presents an analytical model of wireless networks using the IEEE 802.11 protocol to access the transport medium. The model allows to determine such key factors of the quality of service as transmission delays and losses. The model is based on diffusion approximation approach which was proposed three decades ago to model wired networks. We show that it can be adapted to take into consideration the input streams with general interarrival time distributions and servers with general service time distributions. The diffusion approximation has been chosen because of fairly general assumptions of models based on it, hard to be represented in Markov models. A queueing network model can have an arbitrary topology, the intensity of transmitted flows can be represented by non-Poisson (even self-similar) streams, the service times at nodes can be defined by general distributions. These assumptions are important: because of the CSMA/CA algorithm, the overall times needed to sent a packet are far from being exponentially distributed and therefore the flows between nodes are non-Poisson. Diffusion approximation allows us also to analyse the of transient behaviour of a network when traffic intensity is changing with time.

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