Adaptive mechanism-based congestion control for networked systems

Abstract

In order to assure the communication quality in network systems with heavy traffic and limited bandwidth, a new ATRED (adaptive thresholds random early detection) congestion control algorithm is proposed for the congestion avoidance and resource management of network systems. Different to the traditional AQM (active queue management) algorithms, the control parameters of ATRED are not configured statically, but dynamically adjusted by the adaptive mechanism. By integrating with the adaptive strategy, ATRED alleviates the tuning difficulty of RED (random early detection) and shows a better control on the queue management, and achieve a more robust performance than RED under varying network conditions. Furthermore, a dynamic transmission control protocol–AQM control system using ATRED controller is introduced for the systematic analysis. It is proved that the stability of the network system can be guaranteed when the adaptive mechanism is finely designed. Simulation studies show the proposed ATRED algorithm achieves a good performance in varying network environments, which is superior to the RED and Gentle-RED algorithm, and providing more reliable service under varying network conditions.

Keywords:

• networked control
• congestion control
• active queue management
• RED

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Project U0735003 and 60974047, the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province under Project 8351009001000002 and 9151009001000011, Science and Technology Plan Projects of Guangdong Province under Project 2009B010900051, FOK Ying Tung Education Foundation of China under Project 121061, High-Level Professionals Project of Guangdong Province, the National Fundamental Research 973 Program of China under Grant 2011CB302801 and Macau Science and Technology Development Fund under Grant 008/2010/A1.