Collision resolution in multiple access networks with physical-layer network coding and distributed fountain coding

We propose two new protocols based on physical layer network coding for collision resolution in multiple access networks. When a collision occurs the receiver decodes the sum of the collided packets and after a number of transmissions, equal to or slightly higher than the number of original packets, it can recover all of them. One of the proposed protocols based on fountain codes can resolve collisions by sending out just one acknowledgement (ACK), thus being particularly suited to networks with large round trip delays such as satellite networks. We carry out a comparison of the average delay achieved by the proposed schemes with other access techniques, and show how the performance can be improved with little coordination at the receiver.