article

Uni-MUMAC: a unified down/up-link MU-MIMO MAC protocol for IEEE 802.11ac WLANs

Authors:

Boris Bellalta,

Trang Minh Cao,

Miquel OliverAuthors Info & Claims

Wireless Networks, Volume 21, Issue 5

Pages 1457 - 1472

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-014-0861-4

Published: 01 July 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Due to the dominance of the downlink traffic in Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs), a large number of previous research efforts have been put to enhance the downlink transmission, namely, from the Access Point (AP) to stations (STAs). The downlink Multi-User Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MU-MIMO) technique, supported by the latest IEEE amendment-802.11ac, is considered as one of the key enhancements leading WLANs to the Gigabit era. However, as cloud uploading services, Peer-to-Peer and telepresence applications get popular, the need for higher uplink capacity becomes inevitable. In this paper, a unified down/up-link Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol called Uni-MUMAC is proposed to enhance the performance of IEEE 802.11ac WLANs by exploring the multi-user spatial multiplexing technique. Specifically, in the downlink, we implement an IEEE 802.11ac-compliant MU-MIMO transmission scheme to allow the AP to simultaneously send frames to a group of STAs. In the uplink, we extend the traditional one round channel access contention to two rounds, which coordinate multiple STAs to transmit frames to the AP simultaneously. 2-nd round Contention Window $$(CW_{\rm 2nd})$$(CW2nd), a parameter that makes the length of the 2-nd contention round elastic according to the traffic condition, is introduced. Uni-MUMAC is evaluated through simulations in saturated and non-saturated conditions when both downlink and uplink traffic are present in the system. We also propose an analytic saturation model to validate the simulation results. By properly setting $$CW_{\rm 2nd}$$CW2nd and other parameters, Uni-MUMAC is compared to a prominent multi-user transmission scheme in the literature. The results exhibit that Uni-MUMAC not only performs well in the downlink-dominant scenario, but it is also able to balance both the downlink and uplink throughput in the emerging uplink bandwidth-hungry scenario.

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Cited By

He PAnpalagan AEjaz W(2024)Energy-Efficient Power Allocation Maximization for Multi-User MIMO Broadcast ChannelIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications10.1109/TWC.2023.329445923:3(2011-2024)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/TWC.2023.3294459
He PAnpalagan AEjaz W(2023)Energy-Efficient Power Allocation Maximization for MU-MIMO Multiple Access ChannelsIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications10.1109/TWC.2022.321874422:5(3460-3471)Online publication date: 1-May-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/TWC.2022.3218744
Sarker MUddin M(2019)Saturation throughput analysis of a carrier sensing based MU-MIMO MAC protocol in a WLAN under fading and shadowingWireless Networks10.1007/s11276-017-1614-y25:3(933-950)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s11276-017-1614-y
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Uni-MUMAC: a unified down/up-link MU-MIMO MAC protocol for IEEE 802.11ac WLANs
1. General and reference
  1. Cross-computing tools and techniques
2. Networks
  1. Network properties
  2. Network types

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cover image Wireless Networks

Wireless Networks Volume 21, Issue 5

July 2015

329 pages

ISSN:1022-0038

Issue’s Table of Contents

Copyright © Copyright © 2015 Springer Science+Business Media New York.

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Springer-Verlag

Berlin, Heidelberg

Publication History

Published: 01 July 2015

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Cited By

He PAnpalagan AEjaz W(2024)Energy-Efficient Power Allocation Maximization for Multi-User MIMO Broadcast ChannelIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications10.1109/TWC.2023.329445923:3(2011-2024)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/TWC.2023.3294459
He PAnpalagan AEjaz W(2023)Energy-Efficient Power Allocation Maximization for MU-MIMO Multiple Access ChannelsIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications10.1109/TWC.2022.321874422:5(3460-3471)Online publication date: 1-May-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/TWC.2022.3218744
Sarker MUddin M(2019)Saturation throughput analysis of a carrier sensing based MU-MIMO MAC protocol in a WLAN under fading and shadowingWireless Networks10.1007/s11276-017-1614-y25:3(933-950)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s11276-017-1614-y
Ali MMisic JMisic V(2018)Uplink Access Protocol in IEEE 802.11acIEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications10.1109/TWC.2018.284541017:8(5535-5551)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/TWC.2018.2845410

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