Hybrid ARQ with Rate Adaptation in Multiband OFDM UWB Systems

In this paper, we propose a cross-layer design (CLD) scheme combining rate adaptation and four types of hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) for multiband orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (MB-OFDM) ultra wideband (UWB) systems following the ECMA-368 standard. The time varying property is incorporated into standard UWB channel models for the purpose of investigating rate adaptation. To accurately accommodate fast time-varying channel conditions, we propose to embed the selected rate information into the acknowledgement (ACK) frames. It is shown that the proposed CLD scheme combining rate adaptation and HARQ can provide higher throughput than the HARQ-only schemes. Among the four types of HARQ schemes, HARQ Type-III has the best throughput performance while Type I has the worst.