A Framework for Maximum Capacity in Multi-channel Multi-radio Wireless Networks

Wireless networks with multi-channel multi-radio availability are attracting more and more attention from the research community because of its performance improvement and relatively low cost and complexity. Most work in the literature consider the performance of multi-channel multi-radio wireless networks with predefined numbers of channels and radios, and develop algorithms for channel allocation and transmission scheduling. The capacity limit on multi-channel multi-radio wireless networks was seldom addressed before. In this work, we study two problems: In a specific topology, 1) what is the maximum capacity we can get given the number of channels and radios? and 2) what is the impact of the number of radios on the system performance? To answer the above questions, we propose a general framework to find the maximum capacity given a multi-channel multi-radio wireless network. Its result also provides an indication of the "goodness" of a topology. We then use the framework to study the impact of radio constraints.