CAREER: Scalable Distributed MIMO: Towards Density-Proportional Capacity Scaling for Infrastructure Wireless Networks

职业：可扩展分布式 MIMO：实现基础设施无线网络的密度比例容量扩展

• 批准号: 1854472
• 负责人: Xinyu Zhang
• 金额: $ 39.26万
• 依托单位: University of California-San Diego
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-03-15 至 2020-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1854472&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Scalable; Distributed; MIMO; Towards

The proliferation of mobile devices is driving an ever-increasing demand on the capacity of infrastructure wireless networks, especially Wi-Fi. Current wireless networks can hardly meet this demand because they are interference limited -- per-user throughput decreases super-linearly with network density. Adding more access points (APs) may worsen the problem, because the APs themselves interfere with each other. The objective of this research is to overcome this fundamental limitation, and enable network capacity to scale proportionally with node density, by exploring a transformative architecture called Scalable Distributed MIMO (SDM). The principle behind SDM is to reorganize the APs into clusters. Within each cluster, the APs tightly synchronize and share data with each other. This enables them to cancel the mutual interference and scale network capacity with AP density. Different AP clusters contend for channel access in a self-organized manner, thus scaling capacity across an entire network. The long-term objective of SDM is to enable dense indoor infrastructure networks supporting Gbps per-user throughput, marking an important step towards the goals outlined in the National Broadband Plan. To realize the SDM principle, the proposed research synthesizes a comprehensive framework of tasks spanning five years, including performance modeling/analysis, network protocol/algorithm design, and implementation/experimentation on a software radio testbed. In particular, the PI plans to (i) systematically explore ways of deploying AP clusters to balance the tradeoffs between system complexity, scalability, and compatibility with legacy networks; (ii) design a new paradigm of cluster-centric network protocols that feature tight coordination between APs within a cluster and self-organization among different clusters; (iii) develop new communications algorithms that tame the coordination overhead while maximizing cluster capacity, and translate the capacity gain into improved end-user experience. The testbed used in the research tasks will be extended into a user-friendly educational platform that enhances the knowledge of wireless networks for students at different levels. The research and educational materials will be broadly disseminated for reproducibility of results.

移动设备的激增推动了对基础设施无线网络（尤其是 Wi-Fi）容量的需求不断增长。当前的无线网络很难满足这一需求，因为它们的干扰有限——每用户吞吐量随网络密度超线性下降。 添加更多接入点 (AP) 可能会使问题变得更糟，因为 AP 本身会互相干扰。 本研究的目的是通过探索一种称为可扩展分布式 MIMO (SDM) 的变革性架构，克服这一基本限制，并使网络容量能够与节点密度成比例地扩展。 SDM 背后的原理是将 AP 重新组织成集群。在每个集群内，AP 彼此紧密同步并共享数据。这使他们能够消除相互干扰并通过 AP 密度扩展网络容量。不同的AP集群以自组织的方式竞争信道访问，从而扩展整个网络的容量。 SDM 的长期目标是实现支持每用户 Gbps 吞吐量的密集室内基础设施网络，这标志着朝着国家宽带计划中概述的目标迈出了重要一步。 为了实现SDM原理，所提出的研究综合了跨越五年的任务的综合框架，包括性能建模/分析、网络协议/算法设计以及软件无线电测试台上的实现/实验。具体而言，PI 计划 (i) 系统地探索部署 AP 集群的方法，以平衡系统复杂性、可扩展性以及与传统网络的兼容性之间的权衡； (ii) 设计一种以集群为中心的网络协议的新范式，其特点是集群内 AP 之间的紧密协调以及不同集群之间的自组织； (iii) 开发新的通信算法，在最大限度地提高集群容量的同时控制协调开销，并将容量增益转化为改善的最终用户体验。 研究任务中使用的测试平台将扩展为一个用户友好的教育平台，以增强不同级别学生的无线网络知识。研究和教育材料将广泛传播，以确保结果的可重复性。