A Cross-Layer Adaptation for VoIP over Infrastructure Mesh Network

The deployment of wireless mesh paradigm was meant to extend Internet access without a consideration of delay sensitive applications. None the less, since voice over IP (VoIP) services are rapidly increasing in popularity, IEEE 802.11 based wireless mesh networks are challenged with the provision of guaranteed quality VoIP calls. In this paper, the disquiet on VoIP systems caused by physical (PHY) and medium access control (MAC) anomaly in the current wireless mesh deployment is addressed through a cross-layer scheme. The scheme is aimed at enhancing VoIP call capacity by mitigating PHY and MAC overheads through aggregation of packets of the same next hop. Through simulations, it is shown that the proposed scheme has significant performance improvements while leaving the IEEE 802.11 standard intact.