Dynamic algorithms for multicast with intra-session network coding

The problem of multiple multicast sessions with intra-session network coding in time-varying networks is considered. The network-layer capacity region of input rates that can be stably supported is established. Dynamic algorithms for multicast routing, network coding, power allocation, session scheduling, and rate allocation across correlated sources, which achieve stability for rates within the capacity region, are presented. This work builds on the back-pressure approach introduced by Tassiulas et al., extending it to network coding and correlated sources. In the proposed algorithms, decisions on routing, network coding, and scheduling between different sessions at a node are made locally at each node based on virtual queues for different sinks. For correlated sources, the sinks locally determine and control transmission rates across the sources. The proposed approach yields a completely distributed algorithm for wired networks. In the wireless case, power control among different transmitters is centralized while routing, network coding, and scheduling between different sessions at a given node are distributed

Effective Scheduling for Coded Distributed Storage in Wireless Sensor Networks

A distributed storage approach is proposed to access data reliably and to cope with node failures in wireless sensor networks. This approach is based on random linear network coding in combination with a scheduling algorithm based on backpressure. Upper bounds are provided on the maximum rate at which data can be reliably stored. Moreover, it is shown that the backpressure algorithm allows to operate the network in a decentralized fashion for any rate below this maximum

Achievable Rate and Optimal Physical Layer Rate Allocation in Interference-Free Wireless Networks

We analyze the achievable rate in interference-free wireless networks with physical layer fading channels and orthogonal multiple access. As a starting point, the point-to-point channel is considered. We find the optimal physical and network layer rate trade-off which maximizes the achievable overall rate for both a fixed rate transmission scheme and an improved scheme based on multiple virtual users and superposition coding. These initial results are extended to the network setting, where, based on a cut-set formulation, the achievable rate at each node and its upper bound are derived. We propose a distributed optimization algorithm which allows to jointly determine the maximum achievable rate, the optimal physical layer rates on each network link, and an opportunistic back-pressure-type routing strategy on the network layer. This inherently justifies the layered architecture in existing wireless networks. Finally, we show that the proposed layered optimization approach can achieve almost all of the ergodic network capacity in high SNR.Comment: 5 pages, to appear in Proc. IEEE ISIT, July 200

ARQ for Network Coding

A new coding and queue management algorithm is proposed for communication networks that employ linear network coding. The algorithm has the feature that the encoding process is truly online, as opposed to a block-by-block approach. The setup assumes a packet erasure broadcast channel with stochastic arrivals and full feedback, but the proposed scheme is potentially applicable to more general lossy networks with link-by-link feedback. The algorithm guarantees that the physical queue size at the sender tracks the backlog in degrees of freedom (also called the virtual queue size). The new notion of a node "seeing" a packet is introduced. In terms of this idea, our algorithm may be viewed as a natural extension of ARQ schemes to coded networks. Our approach, known as the drop-when-seen algorithm, is compared with a baseline queuing approach called drop-when-decoded. It is shown that the expected queue size for our approach is $O(\frac1{1-\rho})$ as opposed to $\Omega(\frac1{(1-\rho)^2})$ for the baseline approach, where $\rho$ is the load factor.Comment: Submitted to the 2008 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT 2008

On network coding and routing in dynamic wireless multicast networks

We compare multicast network coding and routing for a time-varying wireless network model with interference- determined link capacities. We use dynamic back pressure algorithms that are optimal for intra-session network coding and routing respectively. Our results suggest that under such conditions, the gap in multicast capacity between network coding and routing can decrease relative to a collision-based wireless model with fixed link capacities

The Implementation of One Opportunistic Routing in Wireless Networks

In the paper, it proposes an optimization framework addressing fairness issues for opportunity routing in wireless mesh networks, where we use network coding to ease the routing problem. We propose a distributed heuristic algorithm in the case when scheduling is determined by MAC, and discuss the suitability of our algorithm through simulations. It is found that in most situations our algorithm has better performances than the single-path algorithm and the classical network coding which is based opportunity algorithm MORE

Network Coding in a Multicast Switch

We consider the problem of serving multicast flows in a crossbar switch. We show that linear network coding across packets of a flow can sustain traffic patterns that cannot be served if network coding were not allowed. Thus, network coding leads to a larger rate region in a multicast crossbar switch. We demonstrate a traffic pattern which requires a switch speedup if coding is not allowed, whereas, with coding the speedup requirement is eliminated completely. In addition to throughput benefits, coding simplifies the characterization of the rate region. We give a graph-theoretic characterization of the rate region with fanout splitting and intra-flow coding, in terms of the stable set polytope of the 'enhanced conflict graph' of the traffic pattern. Such a formulation is not known in the case of fanout splitting without coding. We show that computing the offline schedule (i.e. using prior knowledge of the flow arrival rates) can be reduced to certain graph coloring problems. Finally, we propose online algorithms (i.e. using only the current queue occupancy information) for multicast scheduling based on our graph-theoretic formulation. In particular, we show that a maximum weighted stable set algorithm stabilizes the queues for all rates within the rate region.Comment: 9 pages, submitted to IEEE INFOCOM 200