arXiv subjects

Anurag Kumar

Publications and source records attributed to Anurag Kumar.

At least 127 records · Page 7Linked to original sources

arXiv2012

Spread of Influence and Content in Mobile Opportunistic Networks

We consider a setting in which a single item of content (such as a song or a video clip) is disseminated in a population of mobile nodes by opportunistic copying when pairs of nodes come in radio contact. We propose and study models that capture the joint evolution of the population of nodes interested in the content (referred to as destinations), and the population of nodes that possess the content. The evolution of interest in the content is captured using an influence spread model and the content spread occurs via epidemic copying. Nodes not yet interested in the content are called relays; the influence spread process converts relays into destinations. We consider the decentralized setting, where interest in the content and the spread of the content evolve by pairwise interactions between the mobiles. We derive fluid limits for the joint evolution models and obtain optimal policies for copying to relay nodes in order to deliver content to a desired fraction of destinations. We prove that a time-threshold policy is optimal while copying to relays. We then provide insights into the effects of various system parameters on the co-evolution model through simulations.

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arXiv2012

Optimal Sequential Wireless Relay Placement on a Random Lattice Path

Our work is motivated by the need for impromptu (or "as-you-go") deployment of relay nodes (for establishing a packet communication path with a control centre) by fire-men/commandos while operating in an unknown environment. We consider a model, where a deployment operative steps along a random lattice path whose evolution is Markov. At each step, the path can randomly either continue in the same direction or take a turn "North" or "East," or come to an end, at which point a data source (e.g., a temperature sensor) has to be placed that will send packets to a control centre at the origin of the path. A decision has to be made at each step whether or not to place a wireless relay node. Assuming that the packet generation rate by the source is very low, and simple link-by-link scheduling, we consider the problem of relay placement so as to minimize the expectation of an end-to-end cost metric (a linear combination of the sum of convex hop costs and the number of relays placed). This impromptu relay placement problem is formulated as a total cost Markov decision process. First, we derive the optimal policy in terms of an optimal placement set and show that this set is characterized by a boundary beyond which it is optimal to place. Next, based on a simpler alternative one-step-look-ahead characterization of the optimal policy, we propose an algorithm which is proved to converge to the optimal placement set in a finite number of steps and which is faster than the traditional value iteration. We show by simulations that the distance based heuristic, usually assumed in the literature, is close to the optimal provided that the threshold distance is carefully chosen.

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arXiv2012

Neighbor Oblivious and Finite-State Algorithms for Circumventing Local Minima in Geographic Forwarding

We propose distributed link reversal algorithms to circumvent communication voids in geographic routing. We also solve the attendant problem of integer overflow in these algorithms. These are achieved in two steps. First, we derive partial and full link reversal algorithms that do not require one-hop neighbor information, and convert a destination-disoriented directed acyclic graph (DAG) to a destination-oriented DAG. We embed these algorithms in the framework of Gafni and Bertsekas ("Distributed algorithms for generating loop-free routes in networks with frequently changing topology", 1981) in order to establish their termination properties. We also analyze certain key properties exhibited by our neighbor oblivious link reversal algorithms, e.g., for any two neighbors, their t-states are always consecutive integers, and for any node, its t-state size is upper bounded by log(N). In the second step, we resolve the integer overflow problem by analytically deriving one-bit full link reversal and two-bit partial link reversal versions of our neighbor oblivious link reversal algorithms.

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arXiv2012

Performance Analysis of Beacon-Less IEEE 802.15.4 Multi-Hop Networks

We develop an approximate analytical technique for evaluating the performance of multi-hop networks based on beacon-less CSMA/CA as standardised in IEEE 802.15.4, a popular standard for wireless sensor networks. The network comprises sensor nodes, which generate measurement packets, and relay nodes which only forward packets. We consider a detailed stochastic process at each node, and analyse this process taking into account the interaction with neighbouring nodes via certain unknown variables (e.g., channel sensing rates, collision probabilities, etc.). By coupling these analyses of the various nodes, we obtain fixed point equations that can be solved numerically to obtain the unknown variables, thereby yielding approximations of time average performance measures, such as packet discard probabilities and average queueing delays. Different analyses arise for networks with no hidden nodes and networks with hidden nodes. We apply this approach to the performance analysis of tree networks rooted at a data sink. Finally, we provide a validation of our analysis technique against simulations.

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arXiv2011

Combined Base Station Association and Power Control in Multi-channel Cellular Networks

A combined base station association and power control problem is studied for the uplink of multichannel multicell cellular networks, in which each channel is used by exactly one cell (i.e., base station). A distributed association and power update algorithm is proposed and shown to converge to a Nash equilibrium of a noncooperative game. We consider network models with discrete mobiles (yielding an atomic congestion game), as well as a continuum of mobiles (yielding a population game). We find that the equilibria need not be Pareto efficient, nor need they be system optimal. To address the lack of system optimality, we propose pricing mechanisms. It is shown that these mechanisms can be implemented in a distributed fashion.

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arXiv2011

Optimal Forwarding in Delay Tolerant Networks with Multiple Destinations

We study the trade-off between delivery delay and energy consumption in a delay tolerant network in which a message (or a file) has to be delivered to each of several destinations by epidemic relaying. In addition to the destinations, there are several other nodes in the network that can assist in relaying the message. We first assume that, at every instant, all the nodes know the number of relays carrying the packet and the number of destinations that have received the packet. We formulate the problem as a controlled continuous time Markov chain and derive the optimal closed loop control (i.e., forwarding policy). However, in practice, the intermittent connectivity in the network implies that the nodes may not have the required perfect knowledge of the system state. To address this issue, we obtain an ODE (i.e., a deterministic fluid) approximation for the optimally controlled Markov chain. This fluid approximation also yields an asymptotically optimal open loop policy. Finally, we evaluate the performance of the deterministic policy over finite networks. Numerical results show that this policy performs close to the optimal closed loop policy.

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arXiv2011

Co-evolution of Content Popularity and Delivery in Mobile P2P Networks

Mobile P2P technology provides a scalable approach to content delivery to a large number of users on their mobile devices. In this work, we study the dissemination of a \emph{single} content (e.g., an item of news, a song or a video clip) among a population of mobile nodes. Each node in the population is either a \emph{destination} (interested in the content) or a potential \emph{relay} (not yet interested in the content). There is an interest evolution process by which nodes not yet interested in the content (i.e., relays) can become interested (i.e., become destinations) on learning about the popularity of the content (i.e., the number of already interested nodes). In our work, the interest in the content evolves under the \emph{linear threshold model}. The content is copied between nodes when they make random contact. For this we employ a controlled epidemic spread model. We model the joint evolution of the copying process and the interest evolution process, and derive the joint fluid limit ordinary differential equations. We then study the selection of the parameters under the content provider's control, for the optimization of various objective functions that aim at maximizing content popularity and efficient content delivery.

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arXiv2011

Distributed Detection/Isolation Procedures for Quickest Event Detection in Large Extent Wireless Sensor Networks

We study a problem of distributed detection of a stationary point event in a large extent wireless sensor network ($\wsn$), where the event influences the observations of the sensors only in the vicinity of where it occurs. An event occurs at an unknown time and at a random location in the coverage region (or region of interest ($\ROI$)) of the $\wsn$. We consider a general sensing model in which the effect of the event at a sensor node depends on the distance between the event and the sensor node; in particular, in the Boolean sensing model, all sensors in a disk of a given radius around the event are equally affected. Following the prior work reported in \cite{nikiforov95change_isolation}, \cite{nikiforov03lower-bound-for-det-isolation}, \cite{tartakovsky08multi-decision}, {\em the problem is formulated as that of detecting the event and locating it to a subregion of the $\ROI$ as early as possible under the constraints that the average run length to false alarm ($\tfa$) is bounded below by $γ$, and the probability of false isolation ($\pfi$) is bounded above by $α$}, where $γ$ and $α$ are target performance requirements. In this setting, we propose distributed procedures for event detection and isolation (namely $\mx$, $\all$, and $\hall$), based on the local fusion of $\CUSUM$s at the sensors. For these procedures, we obtain bounds on the maximum mean detection/isolation delay ($\add$), and on $\tfa$ and $\pfi$, and thus provide an upper bound on $\add$ as $\min\{γ,1/α\} \to \infty$. For the Boolean sensing model, we show that an asymptotic upper bound on the maximum mean detection/isolation delay of our distributed procedure scales with $γ$ and $α$ in the same way as the asymptotically optimal centralised procedure \cite{nikiforov03lower-bound-for-det-isolation}.

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arXiv2011

Optimum Sleep-Wake Scheduling of Sensors for Quickest Event Detection in Small Extent Wireless Sensor Networks

We consider the problem of quickest event detection with sleep-wake scheduling in small extent wireless sensor networks in which, at each time slot, each sensor node in the awake state observes a sample and communicates the information to the fusion centre. The sensor nodes in the sleep state do not sample or communicate any information to the fusion centre (FC), thereby conserving energy. At each time slot, the FC, after having received the samples from the sensor nodes in the wake state, makes a decision to stop (and thus declare that the event has occurred) or to continue observing. If it decides to continue, the FC also makes the decision of choosing the number of sensor nodes to be in the wake state in the next time slot. We consider three alternative approaches to the problem of choosing the number of sensor nodes to be in the wake state in time slot k+1, based on the information available at time slot k, namely, 1. optimal control of M_{k+1}, the number of sensor nodes to be in the awake state in time slot k+1, 2. optimal control of q_{k+1}, the probability of a sensor node to be in the awake state in time slot k+1, and 3. optimal probability q that a sensor node is in the awake state in any time slot. In each case, we formulate the problem as a sequential decision process. We show that a sufficient statistic for the decision at time k is the a posteriori probability of change Pi_k. Also, we show that the optimal stopping rule is a threshold rule on Pi_k. The optimal policy for M_{k+1} can keep very few sensors wake during the prechange phase and then quickly increase the number of sensors in the wake state when a change is "suspected". Among the three sleep-wake algorithms described, we observe that the total cost is minimum for the optimum control of M_{k+1} and is maximum for the optimum control on q.

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arXiv2011

Delay Optimal Event Detection on Ad Hoc Wireless Sensor Networks

We consider a small extent sensor network for event detection, in which nodes take samples periodically and then contend over a {\em random access network} to transmit their measurement packets to the fusion center. We consider two procedures at the fusion center to process the measurements. The Bayesian setting is assumed; i.e., the fusion center has a prior distribution on the change time. In the first procedure, the decision algorithm at the fusion center is \emph{network-oblivious} and makes a decision only when a complete vector of measurements taken at a sampling instant is available. In the second procedure, the decision algorithm at the fusion center is \emph{network-aware} and processes measurements as they arrive, but in a time causal order. In this case, the decision statistic depends on the network delays as well, whereas in the network-oblivious case, the decision statistic does not depend on the network delays. This yields a Bayesian change detection problem with a tradeoff between the random network delay and the decision delay; a higher sampling rate reduces the decision delay but increases the random access delay. Under periodic sampling, in the network--oblivious case, the structure of the optimal stopping rule is the same as that without the network, and the optimal change detection delay decouples into the network delay and the optimal decision delay without the network. In the network--aware case, the optimal stopping problem is analysed as a partially observable Markov decision process, in which the states of the queues and delays in the network need to be maintained. A sufficient statistic for decision is found to be the network-state and the posterior probability of change having occurred given the measurements received and the state of the network. The optimal regimes are studied using simulation.

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arXiv2011

Spatial SINR Games of Base Station Placement and Mobile Association

We study the question of determining locations of base stations that may belong to the same or to competing service providers. We take into account the impact of these decisions on the behavior of intelligent mobile terminals who can connect to the base station that offers the best utility. The signal to interference and noise ratio is used as the quantity that determines the association. We first study the SINR association-game: we determine the cells corresponding to each base stations, i.e., the locations at which mobile terminals prefer to connect to a given base station than to others. We make some surprising observations: (i) displacing a base station a little in one direction may result in a displacement of the boundary of the corresponding cell to the opposite direction; (ii) A cell corresponding to a BS may be the union of disconnected sub-cells. We then study the hierarchical equilibrium in the combined BS location and mobile association problem: we determine where to locate the BSs so as to maximize the revenues obtained at the induced SINR mobile association game. We consider the cases of single frequency band and two frequency bands of operation. Finally, we also consider hierarchical equilibria in two frequency systems with successive interference cancellation.

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arXiv2011

Relay Selection with Partial Information in Wireless Sensor Networks

Our work is motivated by geographical forwarding of sporadic alarm packets to a base station in a wireless sensor network (WSN), where the nodes are sleep-wake cycling periodically and asynchronously. When a node (referred to as the source) gets a packet to forward, either by detecting an event or from an upstream node, it has to wait for its neighbors in a forwarding set (referred to as relays) to wake-up. Each of the relays is associated with a random reward (e.g., the progress made towards the sink) that is iid. To begin with, the source is uncertain about the number of relays, their wake-up times and the reward values, but knows their distributions. At each relay wake-up instant, when a relay reveals its reward value, the source's problem is to forward the packet or to wait for further relays to wake-up. In this setting, we seek to minimize the expected waiting time at the source subject to a lower bound on the average reward. In terms of the operations research literature, our work can be considered as a variant of the asset selling problem. We formulate the relay selection problem as a partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP), where the unknown state is the number of relays. We begin by considering the case where the source knows the number of relays. For the general case, where the source only knows a pmf on the number of relays, it has to maintain a posterior pmf on the number of relays and forward the packet iff the pmf is in an optimum stopping set. We show that the optimum stopping set is convex and obtain inner and outer bounds to this set. The computational complexity of the above policies motivates us to formulate an alternative simplified model, the optimal policy for which is a simple threshold rule. We provide simulation results to compare the performance of the various one-hop and end-to-end forwarding policies.

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arXiv2010

Distributed Construction of the Critical Geometric Graph in Dense Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks are often modeled in terms of a dense deployment of smart sensor nodes in a two-dimensional region. Give a node deployment, the \emph{critical geometric graph (CGG)} over these locations (i.e., the connected \emph{geometric graph (GG)} with the smallest radius) is a useful structure since it provides the most accurate proportionality between hop-count and Euclidean distance. Hence, it can be used for GPS-free node localisation as well as minimum distance packet forwarding. It is also known to be asymptotically optimal for network transport capacity and power efficiency. In this context, we propose DISCRIT, a distributed and asynchronous algorithm for obtaining an approximation of the CGG on the node locations. The algorithm does not require the knowledge of node locations or internode distances, nor does it require pair-wise RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication) measurements to be made. Instead, the algorithm makes use of successful Hello receipt counts (obtained during a Hello-protocol-based neighbour discovery process) as edge weights, along with a simple distributed min-max computation algorithm. In this paper, we first provide the theory for justifying the use of the above edge weights. Then we provide extensive simulation results to demonstrate the efficacy of DISCRIT in obtaining an approximation of the CGG. Finally, we show how the CGG obtained from DISCRIT performs when used in certain network self-organisation algorithms.

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arXiv2010

State Dependent Attempt Rate Modeling of Single Cell IEEE~802.11 WLANs with Homogeneous Nodes and Poisson Packet Arrivals

Analytical models for IEEE 802.11-based WLANs are invariably based on approximations, such as the well-known \textit{decoupling approximation} proposed by Bianchi for modeling single cell WLANs consisting of saturated nodes. In this paper, we provide a new approach to model the situation when the nodes are not saturated. We study a State Dependent Attempt Rate (SDAR) approximation to model $M$ queues (one queue per node) served by the CSMA/CA protocol as standardized in the IEEE 802.11 DCF MAC protocol. The approximation is that, when $n$ of the $M$ queues are non-empty, the transmission attempt probability of the $n$ non-empty nodes is given by the long-term transmission attempt probability of $n$ "saturated" nodes as provided by Bianchi's model. The SDAR approximation reduces a single cell WLAN with non-saturated nodes to a "coupled queue system". When packets arrive to the $M$ queues according to independent Poisson processes, we provide a Markov model for the coupled queue system with SDAR service. \textit{The main contribution of this paper is to provide an analysis of the coupled queue process by studying a lower dimensional process, and by introducing a certain conditional independence approximation}. We show that the SDAR model of contention provides an accurate model for the DCF MAC protocol in single cells, and report the simulation speed-ups thus obtained by our \textit{model-based simulation}.

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arXiv2010

New Insights from an Analysis of Social Influence Networks under the Linear Threshold Model

We study the spread of influence in a social network based on the Linear Threshold model. We derive an analytical expression for evaluating the expected size of the eventual influenced set for a given initial set, using the probability of activation for each node in the social network. We then provide an equivalent interpretation for the influence spread, in terms of acyclic path probabilities in the Markov chain obtained by reversing the edges in the social network influence graph. We use some properties of such acyclic path probabilities to provide an alternate proof for the submodularity of the influence function. We illustrate the usefulness of the analytical expression in estimating the most influential set, in special cases such as the UILT(Uniform Influence Linear Threshold), USLT(Uniform Susceptance Linear Threshold) and node-degree based influence models. We show that the PageRank heuristic is either provably optimal or performs very well in the above models, and explore its limitations in more general cases. Finally, based on the insights obtained from the analytical expressions, we provide an efficient algorithm which approximates the greedy algorithm for the influence maximization problem.

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arXiv2010

Obstacle Constrained Total Area Coverage in Wireless Sensor Networks

This paper deals with the accomplishment of total area coverage of an arbitrary region using sensors with a finite sensing radius of rs. For a given region, we aim to obtain a deterministic placement of sensors which, apart from ensuring that the entire region comes under the purview of at least a single sensor, minimises the number of sensors utilised. We begin by considering regions devoid of obstacles and thus having every location amenable for placement. Herein, we formalise the popular notion that sensors at the centres of the hexagons of a hexagonal tessellation provide the most optimal placement. We then move on to regions which may comprise obstacles of arbitrary size at arbitrary locations. We recognise two distinct classes of obstacles, namely transparent and opaque obstacles, which are distinguished by their ability (or the lack of it) to permit sensing radiation through them. In the real world, transparent obstacles model lakes, ponds and swamps, while the opaque ones stand for, inter alia, hills, trees and walls.We propose a polynomial-time algorithm for achieving optimal placement in the aforesaid scenarios and we prove its convergence.

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arXiv2009

Analytical Models for Energy Consumption in Infrastructure WLAN STAs Carrying TCP Traffic

We develop analytical models for estimating the energy spent by stations (STAs) in infrastructure WLANs when performing TCP controlled file downloads. We focus on the energy spent in radio communication when the STAs are in the Continuously Active Mode (CAM), or in the static Power Save Mode (PSM). Our approach is to develop accurate models for obtaining the fraction of times the STA radios spend in idling, receiving and transmitting. We discuss two traffic models for each mode of operation: (i) each STA performs one large file download, and (ii) the STAs perform short file transfers. We evaluate the rate of STA energy expenditure with long file downloads, and show that static PSM is worse than just using CAM. For short file downloads we compute the number of file downloads that can be completed with given battery capacity, and show that PSM performs better than CAM for this case. We provide a validation of our analytical models using the NS-2 simulator. In contrast to earlier work on analytical modeling of PSM, our models that capture the details of the interactions between the 802.11 MAC in PSM and certain aspects of TCP.

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arXiv2009

Optimal Routing and Power Control for a Single Cell, Dense, Ad Hoc Wireless Network

We consider a dense, ad hoc wireless network, confined to a small region. The wireless network is operated as a single cell, i.e., only one successful transmission is supported at a time. Data packets are sent between sourcedestination pairs by multihop relaying. We assume that nodes self-organise into a multihop network such that all hops are of length d meters, where d is a design parameter. There is a contention based multiaccess scheme, and it is assumed that every node always has data to send, either originated from it or a transit packet (saturation assumption). In this scenario, we seek to maximize a measure of the transport capacity of the network (measured in bit-meters per second) over power controls (in a fading environment) and over the hop distance d, subject to an average power constraint. We first argue that for a dense collection of nodes confined to a small region, single cell operation is efficient for single user decoding transceivers. Then, operating the dense ad hoc wireless network (described above) as a single cell, we study the hop length and power control that maximizes the transport capacity for a given network power constraint.

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