Load-sensitive routing for mobile ad hoc networks

Abstract

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A mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a collection of wireless mobile computers forming a temporary network with no existing wired infrastructure. Due to the dynamic nature of network topology and the resource constraints, routing in MANETs is a challenging task. Distributing the routing tasks fairly has eminent advantages, such as reducing the possibility of power depletion and queuing delay in the hosts with heavy duties. However, most current routing protocols for MANETs do not take load balancing into account. In this paper, we propose a load-sensitive on-demand routing approach, which utilizes the network load information as the main route selection criterion. We perform a simulation study on the proposed routing protocol. Compared with the dynamic source routing (DSR), our protocol shows better performance in terms of packet delivery ratio and average end-to-end delay. Further, with low mobility, these benefits are gained without an increase in the control overhead.