TY - JOUR
T1 - Leader-contention-based user matching for 802.11 multiuser MIMO networks
AU - Kuo, Tung Wei
AU - Lee, Kuang Che
AU - Lin, Ching-Ju
AU - Tsai, Ming Jer
PY - 2014/1/1
Y1 - 2014/1/1
N2 - In multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO) LANs, the achievable throughput of a client depends on who is transmitting concurrently with it. Existing MU-MIMO MAC protocols, however, enable clients to use the traditional 802.11 contention to contend for concurrent transmission opportunities on the uplink. Such a contention-based protocol not only wastes lots of channel time on multiple rounds of contention but also fails to maximally deliver the gain of MU-MIMO because users randomly join concurrent transmissions without considering their channel characteristics. To address such inefficiency, this paper introduces MIMOMate, a leader-contention-based MU-MIMO MAC protocol that matches clients as concurrent transmitters according to their channel characteristics to maximally deliver the MU-MIMO gain while ensuring all users fairly share concurrent transmission opportunities. Furthermore, MIMOMate elects the leader of the matched users to contend for transmission opportunities using traditional 802.11 CSMA/CA. It hence requires only a single contention overhead for concurrent streams and can be compatible with legacy 802.11 devices. A prototype implementation in USRP N200 shows that MIMOMate achieves an average throughput gain of 1.42× and 1.52× over the traditional contention-based protocol for two- and three-antenna AP scenarios, respectively, and also provides fairness for clients.
AB - In multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO) LANs, the achievable throughput of a client depends on who is transmitting concurrently with it. Existing MU-MIMO MAC protocols, however, enable clients to use the traditional 802.11 contention to contend for concurrent transmission opportunities on the uplink. Such a contention-based protocol not only wastes lots of channel time on multiple rounds of contention but also fails to maximally deliver the gain of MU-MIMO because users randomly join concurrent transmissions without considering their channel characteristics. To address such inefficiency, this paper introduces MIMOMate, a leader-contention-based MU-MIMO MAC protocol that matches clients as concurrent transmitters according to their channel characteristics to maximally deliver the MU-MIMO gain while ensuring all users fairly share concurrent transmission opportunities. Furthermore, MIMOMate elects the leader of the matched users to contend for transmission opportunities using traditional 802.11 CSMA/CA. It hence requires only a single contention overhead for concurrent streams and can be compatible with legacy 802.11 devices. A prototype implementation in USRP N200 shows that MIMOMate achieves an average throughput gain of 1.42× and 1.52× over the traditional contention-based protocol for two- and three-antenna AP scenarios, respectively, and also provides fairness for clients.
KW - Channel orthogonality
KW - Multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO)
KW - User matching
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84906271276&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/TWC.2014.2320908
DO - 10.1109/TWC.2014.2320908
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84906271276
VL - 13
SP - 4389
EP - 4400
JO - IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications
JF - IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications
SN - 1536-1276
IS - 8
M1 - 6807794
ER -