Power control for IEEE 802.11 ad hoc networks: issues and a new algorithm

We propose an enhancement to the original MAC (multiple access control) protocol in the IEEE 802.11 standard by improving the handshake mechanism and adding one more separate power control channel. With the control channel, the receiver notifies its neighbors about the noise tolerance. Thus, the neighbors can adjust their transmission power levels to avoid packet collision at the receiver. Through extensive simulations on the NS-2 platform, our power control mechanism is found to be effective in that network throughput can be increased by about 10%.