NeTS: Small: Collaborative Research: Mobile Content Distribution in Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks

Virginia Polytechnic Institute And State University, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

Mobile content distribution (MCD) is an important emerging application in vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs). Its high and stable data rate requirement puts significant stress on the severely bandwidth-limited and highly mobile VANETs. Symbol level network coding (SLNC) provides better error-resilience and in turn higher spatial reusability for wireless transmission. It thus is a promising approach for the very bandwidth-hungry MCD networks. This project focuses on two main fundamental problems related to exploiting SLNC for MCD in VANETs. First, a theoretic study on the network capacity and performance bounds achievable by SLNC in mobile wireless networks is carried out. A new model is proposed to characterize the SLNC operation in a flow network setting. Key factors that impact the achievable throughput are identified. Methods to derive accumulated throughput for a mobile receiver following certain mobility pattern are investigated. The second research focus is on the design of distributed and localized algorithms and protocols for MCD networks using SLNC. A suite of new network protocols for SLNC-based MCD network are proposed in order to maximize the throughput of the MCD network.