Dynamic Channel and Interface Management in Multi-channel Multi-interface Wireless Access Networks

Availability of multiple channels and multiple radio interfaces can lead to substantial improvements in the performance of wireless access networks. The optimal allocation of available channels to the users with multiple interfaces however is not a trivial problem especially in a dynamically varying system. In this paper, we will consider the problem of channel and radio interface management in multi-channel multi-interface wireless access networks. In our model, there is a set of orthogonal channels which is shared among several users. Furthermore, each user is equipped with a fixed number of radio interfaces through which it can communicate with the access point. We also consider exogenous stochastic packet arrivals for each user which may be queued for future transmissions. We introduce a general modelling for multi-channel multi-interface wireless access networks for which we propose a throughput optimal channel/interface allocation policy that stabilizes the system for all the arrival rates strictly inside the stability region. We show that the optimal policy determination is equivalent to finding the maximum weighted matching in a bipartite graph at every time slot. Finally, we characterize the stability region for specific cases of the proposed model. Simulation is used to compare the performance of the optimal policy with some other policies in terms of average total queue occupancy.