A Divide-and-Conquer Scheme for Assigning Roles in Multi-Channel Wireless Mesh Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a divide-and-conquer role assignment scheme for multi-channel wireless mesh networks using a novel reversible Weakly Connected Dominating Set, improving network throughput and maintaining connectivity.

Contribution

It extends the WCDS concept to r-WCDS with new constraints and proposes a cluster-based MILP approach for role assignment in Molecular MAC networks.

Findings

Performance close to centralized algorithms

Effective role and channel assignment in multi-channel networks

Maintains global connectivity with cluster-based scheme

Abstract

A multi-channel MAC seems to be an interesting approach for improving network throughput by multiplexing transmissions over orthogonal channels. In particular, Molecular MAC has recently proposed to modify the standard IEEE 802.11 DCF access method to use dynamic channel switching for efficient packet forwarding over multiple hops. However, this MAC layer requires role and channel assignment to nodes: some of them use a static channel, while others dynamically switch to neighbor channels on-demand. To assign roles and channels, we extend the notion of the Weakly Connected Dominating Set, the structure already used in clustering. More precisely, we adapt the WCDS structure and introduce new constraints to define what we call a reversible WCDS (r-WCDS), which is particularly suitable for wireless mesh networks operating under Molecular MAC. We propose a divide-and-conquer scheme that partitions the network into clusters with one leader per cluster solving a MILP formulation to assign roles in its cluster. By appropriately defining the roles at the border of clusters, we maintain global connectivity in the r-wcds. Finally, our simulations show that the performance of the propose scheme is close to a centralized algorithm.