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Opportunistic media access control and routing for delay-tolerant mobile ad hoc networks

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Abstract

In delay-tolerant mobile ad hoc networks, motion of network nodes, network sparsity and sporadic density can cause a lack of guaranteed connectivity. These networks experience significant link delay and their routing protocols must take a store-and-forward approach. In this paper, an opportunistic routing protocol is proposed, along with its compatible media access control, for non-real-time services in delay-tolerant networks. The scheme is mobility-aware such that each network node needs to know its own position and velocity. The media access control employs a four-fold handshake procedure to probe the wireless channel and cooperatively prioritize candidate nodes for packet replication. It exploits the broadcast characteristic of the wireless medium to utilize long-range but unreliable links. The routing process seizes opportunities of node contacts for data delivery. It takes a multiple-copy approach that is adaptive with node movements. Numerical results in mobile ad hoc networks and vehicular ad hoc networks show superior performance of the proposed protocol compared with other routing protocols. The mobility-aware media access control and routing scheme exhibits relatively small packet delivery delay and requires a modest amount of total packet replications/transmissions.

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Notes

  1. For packet replication in multiple-copy routing described in the next section, the source node does not drop the packet.

  2. Various speed limits make v m a non-universal quantity in the network. This can be exploited to improve the MAC protocol.

  3. This is to imitate the vehicular networks simulated later.

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  1. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Baylor University, Waco, TX, 76798-7356, USA

    Liang Dong

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Correspondence to Liang Dong.

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Dong, L. Opportunistic media access control and routing for delay-tolerant mobile ad hoc networks. Wireless Netw 18, 949–965 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-012-0444-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-012-0444-1

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