Adaptive Relaying Method Selection for Multi-Rate Wireless Networks with Network Coding

To maximize the throughput of multi-rate wireless networks, in this letter, we propose a scheme to adaptively select the relaying method among analog network coding (ANC), conventional network coding (CNC), no relaying (i.e. direct transmission without relaying), and plain routing. We first discuss the achievable data rates with different relaying methods under specific channel conditions, and then propose an algorithm with polynomial-time complexity that provides a sub-optimal solution to the relaying method selection problem. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme can effectively improve the network throughput compared with existing schemes, and its performance is near to the optimal performance. The results in this letter also provide some insights for the design of routing protocols in the future.