Network-assisted diversity for random access wireless networks

A novel viewpoint to the collision resolution problem is introduced in this paper for wireless slotted random access networks. This viewpoint is based on signal separation principles borrowed from signal processing problems. The received collided packets are not discarded in this approach but are ex ploited to extract each individual user packet information. In particular, if k users collide in a given time slot, they repeat their transmission for a total of k times so that k copies of the collided packets are received, Then, the receiver has to resolve a k X k source mixing problem and separat e each individual user. The proposed method does not introduce throughput p enalties since it requires only k slots to transmit Ic colliding packets, P erformance issues that are related to the implementation of the collision d etection algorithm are studied in the paper. The protocol's parameters are optimized to maximize the system throughput.