The Capacity of Random Ad hoc Networks under a Realistic Link Layer Model

The problem of determining asymptotic bounds on the capacity of a random ad hoc network is considered. Previous approaches assumed a threshold-based link layer model in which a packet transmission is successful if the SINR at the receiver is greater than a fixed threshold. In reality, the mapping from SINR to packet success probability is continuous. Hence, over each hop, for every finite SINR, there is a non-zero probability of packet loss. With this more realistic link model, it is shown that for a broad class of routing and scheduling schemes, a fixed fraction of hops on each route have a fixed non-zero packet loss probability. In a large network, a packet travels an asymptotically large number of hops from source to destination. Consequently, it is shown that the cumulative effect of per-hop packet loss results in a per-node throughput of only O(1/n) (instead of Theta(1/sqrt{n log{n}})) as shown previously for the threshold-based link model). A scheduling scheme is then proposed to counter this effect. The proposed scheme improves the link SINR by using conservative spatial reuse, and improves the per-node throughput to O(1/(K_n sqrt{n log{n}})), where each cell gets a transmission opportunity at least once every K_n slots, and K_n tends to infinity as n tends to infinity.