Stability of TCP/RED Systems in AQM Routers

By applying the time-delay control theory to a TCP/RED dynamic model, this note establishes some explicit conditions under which the TCP/RED system is stable in terms of the average queue length. Then, the stability region is discussed. Finally, the results are illustrated by using ns2 simulations, which demonstrates that it is able to choose an appropriate control parameter max/sub p/ of RED based on the stability conditions derived in this note, to achieve satisfactory network performance. It is found, by comparison, that this improved performance is better than that of three other typical active queue management (AQM) schemes-the random exponential marking (REM), proportional-integral (PI) controller, and adaptive virtual queue (AVQ) schemes.