Optimal transmission strategies for channel capture mitigation in Cognitive Radio Networks

Temporal Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) in Cognitive Radio Networks exploits time gaps between the primary users transmissions. In this work, the fundamental performance limit on the throughput of cognitive radio networks that coexist with a primary network that uses a Carrier Sensing Multiple Accesses (CSMA) medium access protocol is studied. Secondary transmission strategies that do not explicitly account for the CSMA protocol of the primary network usually lead to a channel capture. The problem cannot be addressed by monitoring interference or probability of collision. Here we formulate the optimal transmission strategy problem that avoids channel capture. We show the proposed strategy achieves a performance close to the optimal strategy that do not account for channel capture, while completely eliminates channel capture effect.