The Effects of Interelement Spacing in Linear Arrays on Throughput Performance in Ad Hoc Networks

With the high demand for improved signal link quality in ad hoc networks, devices configured with omnidirectional antennas can no longer meet the growing needs in throughput performance, and alternative approaches using antenna arrays that provide directional radiation patterns are sought. This study models an 8-element linear antenna array and examines the effects of interelement spacing of the array on the ad hoc network’s throughput performance. We show through simulation, that as a result of the antenna array, the throughput performance of the network consistently improved compared to that with an omnidirectional antenna. Interestingly, we determined that the maximum increase in performance of over 150% was attained with the smallest interelement spacing of λ 5 . 0 rather than with the larger interelement spacing and higher gain. With null-steering, this performance increased even further to 180%.