Modeling and Analyzing Per-Flow Saturation Throughput for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks with Directional Antennas

Throughput is an important factor to estimate the performance of wireless ad hoc networks. However, what remains unaddressed is how to analyze the per-flow saturation throughput for networks with directional antennas. In this paper, a three-dimensional Markov chain model is used to analyze the per-flow saturation throughput in the typical directional random access protocol (D-MAC protocol). Simulation results show that different flows have different saturation throughputs due to directional hidden terminals. Therefore, this paper focuses on analyzing per-flow saturation throughput in single-hop directional ad hoc networks. It first derives the transmission probability when taking the three-dimensional Markov chain model into account, then analyzes the collision probability of each flow considering collisions caused by directional hidden terminals. The paper further studies the per-flow saturation throughput in the network. Extensive simulations demonstrate the accuracy of the proposed model.