Game-theoretic wireless CSMA MAC protocols: Measurements from an indoor testbed

Game-theory based carrier sense multiple access (CSMA) protocols for wireless networks have recently emerged as a competitive alternative to classical CSMA based medium access control designs. The advantage of game-theory based approaches lies in the scope of precise mathematical analysis and hence predictable performance compared to approaches based on ad-hoc arguments and heuristics. In this poster, we take up a game-theory based design of wireless contention based medium access control (MAC) and implement it in an indoor IEEE 802.11 wireless testbed with 22 programmable wireless nodes. Our measurements show a remarkably good performance of the design (at the unique Nash equilibrium) in terms of aggregate throughput and short-term fairness vis-a-vis the standard DCF algorithm. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first detailed study of game theory-inspired MAC protocols in a wireless network testbed.