US Patent 7626926 Traffic management in a wireless data network

In a radio access network (e.g., a cellular network), a radio node is configured to monitor one or more characteristics of a stream of data packets destined for an access terminal (e.g., a cellular telephone, laptop computer, etc.) to determine whether there is congestion in a network supplying the stream of data packets. If the radio node detects congestion, the radio node transmits a congestion alert to another device to cause the rate at which data enters the network to be slowed. The rate may be slowed either directly (e.g., by an upstream device which slows the rate at which the upstream device supplies the data to the network) or indirectly (e.g., by a downstream device which requests a slower delivery of data from the radio node).