A slotted-CDMA based wireless-ATM link layer : guaranteeing QoS over a wireless link.

Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2000.Future wireless networks will have to handle varying combinations of multimedia traffic that present the network with numerous quality of service (QoS) requirements. The continuously growing demand for mobile phones has resulted in radio spectrum becoming a precious resource that cannot be wasted. The current second-generation mobile networks are designed for voice communication and, even with the enhancements being implemented to accommodate data, they cannot efficiently handle the multimedia traffic demands that will be introduced in the near future. This thesis begins with a survey of existing wireless ATM (WATM) protocols, followed by an examination of some medium access control (MAC) protocols, supporting multimedia traffic, and based on code division multiple access (CDMA) physical layers. A WATM link layer protocol based on a CDMA physical layer, and incorporating techniques from some of the surveyed protocols, is then proposed. The MAC protocol supports a wide range of service requirements by utilising a flexible scheduling algorithm that takes advantage of the graceful degradation of CDMA with increasing user interference to schedule cells for transmission according to their maximum bit error rate (BER) requirements. The data link control (DLC) accommodates the various traffic types by allowing virtual channels (VCs) to make use of forward error correction (FEc) or retransmission techniques. The proposed link layer protocol has been implemented on a Blue Wave Systems DSP board that forms part of Alcatel Altech Telecoms' software radio platform. The details and practicality of the implementation are presented. A simulation model for the protocol has been developed using MIL3 's Opnet Modeler. Hence, both simulated and measured performance results are presented before the thesis concludes with suggestions for improvements and future work

Improving VBR voice performance in integrated services broadband wireless networks

The integration of multimedia applications into future wireless networks is expected to accelerate the demand for incorporating broadband infrastructure into wireless arena. Providing an efficient broadband wireless infrastructure capable to carry a mixture of different services brings a large set of new technical challenges. The current wireless networks that have been designed to carry low bit-rate voice and data are not able to carry bandwidth consuming and delay sensitive multimedia traffic. Consequently fundamental changes at different layers of current technology used in wireless networks are required. In this thesis we focus on Medium Access Control protocols (MAC) suitable for broadband wireless networks. Wireless ATM (WATM) has been considered in this work. This is mainly because it is widely accepted that ATM is the foundation of future broadband networks and integrating ATM into wireless networks provides a seamless interface between wired and wireless environments. We investigate the major recent proposals for MAC protocols for broadband wireless networks and propose a new reservation mechanism for the reservation part of a FDD-based MAC protocol. This novel mechanism is called “Dynamic Hybrid Partitioning with Adjustable Repeat” which helps to improve the performance of the Variable Bit Rate (VBR) voice traffic in a broadband wireless network with integrated traffic. Through a number of simulation experiments based on AKAROA2 [Ewi99J, we analyze the different aspects of our proposed mechanism and show how it improves the performance of the VBR voice traffic sources in a network with different classes of traffic

Improving VBR voice performance in integrated services broadband wireless networks

The integration of multimedia applications into future wireless networks is expected to accelerate the demand for incorporating broadband infrastructure into wireless arena. Providing an efficient broadband wireless infrastructure capable to carry a mixture of different services brings a large set of new technical challenges. The current wireless networks that have been designed to carry low bit-rate voice and data are not able to carry bandwidth consuming and delay sensitive multimedia traffic. Consequently fundamental changes at different layers of current technology used in wireless networks are required. In this thesis we focus on Medium Access Control protocols (MAC) suitable for broadband wireless networks. Wireless ATM (WATM) has been considered in this work. This is mainly because it is widely accepted that ATM is the foundation of future broadband networks and integrating ATM into wireless networks provides a seamless interface between wired and wireless environments. We investigate the major recent proposals for MAC protocols for broadband wireless networks and propose a new reservation mechanism for the reservation part of a FDD-based MAC protocol. This novel mechanism is called “Dynamic Hybrid Partitioning with Adjustable Repeat” which helps to improve the performance of the Variable Bit Rate (VBR) voice traffic in a broadband wireless network with integrated traffic. Through a number of simulation experiments based on AKAROA2 [Ewi99J, we analyze the different aspects of our proposed mechanism and show how it improves the performance of the VBR voice traffic sources in a network with different classes of traffic

Error relilient video communications using high level M-QAM. Modelling and simulation of a comparative analysis of a dual-priority M-QAM transmission system for H.264/AVC video applications over band-limited and error-phone channels.

An experimental investigation of an M level (M = 16, 64 and 256) Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) transmission system suitable for video transmission is presented. The communication system is based on layered video coding and unequal error protection to make the video bitstream robust to channel errors. An implementation is described in which H.264 video is protected unequally by partitioning the compressed data into two layers of different visual importance. The partition scheme is based on a separation of the group of pictures (GoP) in the intra-coded frame (I-frame) and predictive coded frame (P frame). This partition scheme is then applied to split the H.264-coded video bitstream and is suitable for Constant Bit Rate (CBR) transmission. Unequal error protection is based on uniform and non-uniform M-QAM constellations in conjunction with different scenarios of splitting the transmitted symbol for protection of the more important information of the video data; different constellation arrangements are proposed and evaluated to increase the capacity of the high priority layer. The performance of the transmission system is evaluated under Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) and Rayleigh fading conditions. Simulation results showed that in noisy channels the decoded video can be improved by assigning a larger portion of the video data to the enhancement layer in conjunction with non-uniform constellation arrangements; in better channel conditions the quality of the received video can be improved by assigning more bits in the high priority channel and using uniform constellations. The aforementioned varying conditions can make the video transmission more successful over error-prone channels. Further techniques were developed to combat various channel impairments by considering channel coding methods suitable for layered video coding applications. It is shown that a combination of non-uniform M-QAM and forward error correction (FEC) will yield a better performance. Additionally, antenna diversity techniques are examined and introduced to the transmission system that can offer a significant improvement in the quality of service of mobile video communication systems in environments that can be modelled by a Rayleigh fading channel