Packet multiple access
and the Aloha protocol
Eytan Modiano
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics
Eytan Modiano
Slide 1
Packet Multiple Access
PMA
SHARED
UPLINK
TERMINAL
APPL
TERMINAL
TRANS
NET
LLC
DLC MAC
PHYS
TERMINAL
TERMINAL
• Medium Access Control (MAC)
– Regulates access to channel
TERMINAL
• Logical Link Control (LLC)
Eytan Modiano
Slide 2 – All other DLC functions
Examples of Multiple Access Channels
• Local area networks (LANs)
• Satellite channels
• Wireless radio
• Characteristics of Multiple Access Channel
– Shared Transmission Medium
A receiver can hear multiple transmitters
A transmitter can be heard by multiple receivers
– The major problem with multiple access is allocating the channel
between the users
Nodes do not know when other nodes have data to send
Need to coordinate transmissions
Eytan Modiano
Slide 3
Approaches to Multiple Access
• Fixed Assignment (TDMA, FDMA, CDMA)
– Each node is allocated a fixed fraction of bandwidth
– Equivalent to circuit switching
– very inefficient for low duty factor traffic
• Packet multiple access
– Polling
– Reservations and Scheduling
– Random Access
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Slide 4
Aloha
Single receiver, many transmitters
Receiver
...
Transmitters
E.g., Satellite system, wireless
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Slide 5
Slotted Aloha
• Time is divided into “slots” of one packet duration
– E.g., fixed size packets
• When a node has a packet to send, it waits until the start of the
next slot to send it
– Requires synchronization
• If no other nodes attempt transmission during that slot, the
transmission is successful
– Otherwise “collision”
– Collided packet are retransmitted after a random delay
1 2 3 4 5
Success Idle Collision Idle Success
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Slide 6
Slotted Aloha Assumptions
• Poisson external arrivals
• No capture
– Packets involved in a collision are lost
– Capture models are also possible
• Immediate feedback
– Idle (0) , Success (1), Collision (e)
• If a new packet arrives during a slot, transmit in next slot
• If a transmission has a collision, it becomes backlogged and
retransmitted after a random delay
– Let n be the number of backlogged nodes
Eytan Modiano
Slide 7
slotted aloha
• Let g be the attempt rate (the expected number of packets
transmitted in a slot)
– The number of attempted packets per slot is approximately a Poisson
random variable of mean g = λ + n*qr
qr = probability that a backlogged packet is retransmitted in a slot
n = number of backlogged packets
– P (m attempts) = gme-g/m!
– P (idle) = probability of no attempts in a slot = e-g
– p (success) = probability of one attempt in a slot = ge-g
– P (collision) = P (two or more attempts) = 1 - P(idle) - P(success)
Eytan Modiano
Slide 8
Throughput of Slotted Aloha
• The throughput is the fraction of slots that contain a successful
transmission = P(success) = ge-g
– When system is stable throughput must also equal the external
λ
arrival rate (λ)
-1
e
Departure rate
ge-g
1
g
d
ge − g = e − g − ge − g = 0
– What value of g dg(n)
maximizes throughput?
⇒ g =1
– g < 1 => too many idle slots −g
– g > 1 => too many collisions ⇒ P(success) = ge = 1/ e ≈ 0.36
– If g can be kept close to 1, an external arrival rate of 1/e packets per
Eytan Modiano
Slide 9 slot can be sustained
Instability of slotted aloha
• if backlog increases beyond unstable point (bad luck) then it tends
to increase without limit and the departure rate drops to 0
– Aloha is inherently unstable and needs algorithm to keep it stable
• Drift in state n, D(n) is the expected change in backlog over one
time slot
– D(n) = λ - P(success) = λ - g(n)e-g(n)
negative drift
Departure rate negative drift
-1
e
-G
Ge
Arrival rate
λ
positive
Stable drift
Unstable
positive
drift G=0 G=1
G = λ + nq
Eytan Modiano
Slide 10
r
TDM vs. slotted aloha
TDM, m=16
8
DELAY
TDM, m=8
4
ALOHA
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8
ARRIVAL RATE
• Aloha achieves lower delays when arrival rates are low
• TDM results in very large delays with large number of users, while
Aloha is independent of the number of users
Eytan Modiano
Slide 11
Pure (unslotted) Aloha
• New arrivals are transmitted immediately (no slots)
– No need for synchronization
– No need for fixed length packets
• A backlogged packet is retried after an exponentially distributed
random delay with some mean 1/x
• The total arrival process is a time varying Poisson process of rate
g(n) = λ + nx (n = backlog, 1/x = ave. time between retransmissions)
• Note that an attempt suffers a collision if the previous attempt is not
yet finished (ti-ti-1<1) or the next attempt starts too soon (ti+1-ti<1)
New Arrivals
τ τ
3 4
t1 t 2
t 3
t4 t 5
Collision
Eytan Modiano
Slide 12
Retransmission
Throughput of Unslotted Aloha
• An attempt is successful if the inter-attempt intervals on both
sides exceed 1 (for unit duration packets)
– P(success) = e-g x e-g = e-2g
– Throughput (success rate) = ge-2g
– Max throughput at g = 1/2, Throughput = 1/2e ~ 0.18
– Stabilization issues are similar to slotted aloha
– Advantages of unslotted aloha are simplicity and possibility of
unequal length packets
Eytan Modiano
Slide 13
Splitting Algorithms
• More efficient approach to resolving collisions
– Simple feedback (0,1,e)
– Basic idea: assume only two packets are involved in a collision
Suppose all other nodes remain quiet until collision is resolved, and
nodes in the collision each transmit with probability 1/2 until one is
successful
On the next slot after this success, the other node transmits
The expected number of slots for the first success is 2, so the expected
number of slots to transmit 2 packets is 3 slots
Throughput over the 3 slots = 2/3
– In practice above algorithm cannot really work
Cannot assume only two users involved in collision
Practical algorithm must allow for collisions involving unknown number
of users
Eytan Modiano
Slide 14
Tree algorithms
• After a collision, all new arrivals and all backlogged packets not
involved in the collision wait
• Each colliding packet randomly joins either one of two groups
(Left and Right groups)
– Toss of a fair coin
– Left group transmits during next slot while Right group waits
If collision occurs Left group splits again (stack algorithm)
Right group waits until Left collision is resolved
– When Left group is done, right group transmits
(1,2,3,4)
Notice that after the idle slot,
collision collision between (2,3) was
success
sure to happen and could have
(1,2,3)
4 been avoided
collision
success
(2,3)
1
collision
Many variations and improvements
idle (2,3)
on the original tree splitting algorithm
success success
Eytan Modiano
Slide 15
2 3
Throughput comparison
• Stabilized pure aloha T = 0.184 = (1/(2e))
• Stabilized slotted aloha T = 0.368 = (1/e)
• Basic tree algorithm T = 0.434
• Best known variation on tree algorithm T = 0.4878
• Upper bound on any collision resolution algorithm with (0,1,e)
feedback T <= 0.568
• TDM achieves throughputs up to 1 packet per slot, but the delay
increases linearly with the number of nodes
Eytan Modiano
Slide 16
