Cooperative and Noncooperative Flow Control

In this Master Thesis the problem of flow control was studied using the theoretical tools provided by cooperative and noncooperative game theory. In both cases the problem, user strategies and utility functions were modeled. In the noncooperative case, the analysis regarding the existence and uniqueness of Nash equilibrium points was presented and distributed algorithms that converge to such points, under specific conditions, were mentioned. In the cooperative case the notion of fairness was introduced and given a mathematical interpretation in the context of Nash Bargaining Scheme. The analysis regarding the existence and uniqueness of Nash Bargaining Points was presented for the most common utility measures and a short report of the research on the design of distributed algorithms that converge to such point was given. Based on this study, conclusions concerning the differences and the advantages/disadvantages of the two approaches were drawn and open research issues were identified.