Coordinating the SDN and TDMA Planes in Software-Defined Tactical MANETs with Adaptive Coding and Modulation

In this paper, we investigate a tactical mobile ad hoc network (MANET) enhanced with software defined networking (SDN) functionality. Radio transmissions of network links are orchestrated using time division multiple access (TDMA) and are subject to adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) to ad-dress the dynamic variations in the quality of MANET links. A significant challenge within these networks is meeting the quality of service (QoS) demands of end-user data traffic while maintaining the SDN control plane's responsiveness to MANET topology alterations. To address this challenge, we propose a novel approach that concurrently determines the optimal placement of the SDN controller and the transmission scheduling of links in the MANET. The management of residual resources has a direct impact on both performance metrics. Building upon previous research, we present a more comprehensive model of the quality variations of tactical MANET links, elucidating how these variations dictate transmission modes over each link through software-defined radio (SDR) technology and influence the slot allocation process. We contrast our joint optimization algorithm with alternative techniques that manage these two network control mechanisms independently. Numerical evaluations suggest that our proposed algorithm achieves superior performance in comparison with the techniques considered.