Performance Evaluation of Wireless LAN Integration with LTE Heterogeneous Networks

Abstract

Heterogeneous Network (HetNet) refers to the coexistence and cooperation of multiple types of radio access technologies in the same wireless network. Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), also called WiFi, is a local area network whereas a wide area network consists of macrocells, picocells and/or femtocells in a cellular network such as Long Term Evolution (LTE).

In this thesis, the focus is on: (1) Simulation of Layer 1 (physical layer) and Layer 2 (MAC layer) of IEEE 802.11 WLAN standard. (2) Analysis of network performance when a certain amount of LTE traffic is integrated into the WLAN network.

The study aims to investigate the performance in the case where an end-user is connected to WLAN and LTE networks simultaneously. A given amount of traffic is offloaded from LTE network to WLAN, using an access selection technique. The study shows that this method brings performance gains to the end-user in low-load scenarios compared to high-load scenarios. The reasons for the same are studied as well, by analyzing average user throughputs, Block Error Rate (BLER) and WLAN collision rates.