Patent ID: 8155013

Claim:
A method for use in an Automatic Repeat-reQuest (ARQ)-enabled multi-hop network to support synchronized transmission over a specific set of synchronized links, the method comprising: performing pre-transmission of a packet to hops to enable a base station and the plurality of hops in the network to transmit the packet synchronously to one or more mobile stations in the wireless communication system; performing one or more re-transmissions of the packet at a set of one or more hops forming a path in the network if time remaining before a synchronized transmission time for the path as a whole is greater than a threshold; and discarding a packet in a link if an ARQ block lifetime expires for the packet, and a path retransmission budget for a path is large enough to accommodate a link retransmission delay of a link on the path from the base station to the access station but smaller than the sum of the ARQ block lifetime for all the links in the path.