Distributed MAC Protocol Design for Full-Duplex Cognitive Radio Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel full-duplex MAC protocol for cognitive radio networks that allows simultaneous spectrum sensing and data transmission, improving throughput and primary user detection efficiency.

Contribution

It proposes a full-duplex MAC protocol with frame fragmentation and an algorithm for self-interference management, enhancing spectrum sensing and throughput in cognitive radio networks.

Findings

Throughput is significantly improved over half-duplex protocols.

Frame fragmentation enables timely primary user detection.

The protocol effectively manages self-interference and sensing overhead.

Abstract

In this paper, we consider the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol design for full-duplex cognitive radio networks (FDCRNs). Our design exploits the fact that full-duplex (FD) secondary users (SUs) can perform spectrum sensing and access simultaneously, which enable them to detect the primary users' (PUs) activity during transmission. The developed FD MAC protocol employs the standard backoff mechanism as in the 802.11 MAC protocol. However, we propose to adopt the frame fragmentation during the data transmission phase for timely detection of active PUs where each data packet is divided into multiple fragments and the active SU makes sensing detection at the end of each data fragment. Then, we develop a mathematical model to analyze the throughput performance of the proposed FD MAC protocol. Furthermore, we propose an algorithm to configure the MAC protocol so that efficient self-interference management and sensing overhead control can be achieved. Finally, numerical results are presented to evaluate the performance of our design and demonstrate the throughput enhancement compared to the existing half-duplex (HD) cognitive MAC protocol.