System level solutions to optimizing utilization of wireless packet cellular communications over Rayleigh fading channels

The problem of multiaccess in wireless cellular communication systems concerns how to assign transmission resources to many distributed users. Traditional solutions used in Time Division Multiple Access systems have been conservative in their allocation of resources among users in potentially interfering cells, yielding low maximum utilization. Proposed enhancements were designed for circuit-based voice connections over stable channels. They were not conceived for bursty packet streams including data or voice employing silence suppression and have not been studied over fast fading channels.; We have studied various proposed multiaccess protocols using both analysis and computer simulation. We demonstrate that in order for multiaccess protocols to service bursty traffic with maximum possible utilization in fading environments they must be designed according to two guiding principles: they must be packet based and belong to a class of algorithms we define as lossy. Traditionally deployed algorithms are lossless, they are either designed to always achieve at least the minimal signal to interference ratio necessary for correct data reception, or are equipped to allocate resources in real-time such that this minimum is achieved.; We demonstrate that over Rayleigh fading channels, all protocols seeking more than a trivial level of utilization efficiency become lossy. This forces approaches which seek lossless operation to use greater margins in their dynamic resource allocation, resulting in greatly diminished efficiency. In fact only those protocols which are quite conservative in their resource allocation can remain lossless.; Secondly, we propose a technique called Plane Cover Multiple Access for developing packet based multiaccess protocols over Rayleigh fading channels. We show how performance in fading environments is superior to that of other lossy and lossless approaches. PCMA encompasses simple techniques which can be implemented in a completely distributed fashion.; We then investigate PCMA support for Quality of Service guarantees, non-uniform traffic, and multi-hop cellular. We demonstrate how the two virtual cell version of PCMA, the simplest and most effective in most cases, leads naturally to the consideration of two hop maximum multi-hop cellular systems, designed to support delay-sensitive applications. Applications of our results and techniques to CDMA systems are also considered.