Interference-Aware Transmission Power Control for Dense Wireless Networks

In this paper, the authors describe a protocol that manages the transmission power of 802.11 devices to maximize the performance of nodes within an area with a dense concentration of 802.11 networks. They show that it is possible to calculate the ratio between the transmit power of different nodes that maximizes overall network capacity. They present a protocol that implements a distributed version of their transmission power setting algorithm. Their protocol also tunes carrier sense thresholds to ensure that simultaneous transmissions occur when possible. Their evaluation of this protocol using the OPNET simulator shows that it improves network capacity by 22% to 87% over only adjusting carrier sense and by 2% to 67% over using the minimum possible transmit power level.