We present an overview of ad-hoc routing protocols that make forwarding decisions based on the geographical position of a packet's destination. Other than the destination 's position, each node needs to know only its own position and the position of its one-hop neighbors in order to forward packets. Since it is not necessary to maintain explicit routes, position-based routing does scale well even if the network is highly dynamic. This is a major advantage in a mobile ad-hoc network where the topology may change frequently. The main prerequisite for position-based routing is that a sender can obtain the current position of the destination. Therefore, recently proposed location services are discussed in addition to position-based packet forwarding strategies. We provide a qualitative comparison of the approaches in both areas and investigate opportunities for future research.

Recently, a cost aware metric for wireless networks based on remaining battery power at nodes was proposed for shortest-cost routing algorithms, assuming constant transmission power. Power aware metrics where transmission power depends on distance between nodes, and corresponding shortest-power algorithms were also recently proposed. We define a new power-cost metric based on the combination of both node's lifetime and distance based power metrics. We investigate some properties of power adjusted transmissions, and show that, if additional nodes can be placed at desired locations between two nodes at distance d, the transmission power can be made linear in d as opposed to d a dependence for a2. This provides basis for power, cost, and power-cost localized routing algorithms, where nodes make routing decisions solely on the basis of location of their neighbors and destination. Power aware routing algorithm attempts to minimize the total power needed to route a message between a source...

Mobile wireless networks pose interesting challenges for routing system design. To produce feasible routes in a mobile wireless network, a routing system must be able to accommodate roving users, changing network topology, and fluctuating link quality. We discuss the impact of node mobility and wireless communication on routing system design, and we survey the set of techniques employed in or proposed for routing in mobile wireless networks.

AbstractÐIn a localized routing algorithm, each node makes forwarding decisions solely based on the position of itself, its neighbors, and its destination. In distance, progress, and direction-based approaches (reported in the literature), when node A wants to send or forward message m to destination node D, it forwards m to its neighbor C which is closest to D (has best progress toward D, whose direction is closest to the direction of D, respectively) among all neighbors of A. The same procedure is repeated until D, if possible, is eventually reached. The algorithms are referred to as GEDIR, MFR, and DIR when a common failure criterion is introduced: The algorithm stops if the best choice for the current node is the node from which the message came. We propose 2-hop GEDIR, DIR, and MFR methods in which node A selects the best candidate node C among its 1-hop and 2-hop neighbors according to the corresponding criterion and forwards m to its best 1-hop neighbor among joint neighbors of A and C. We then propose flooding GEDIR and MFR and hybrid single-path/flooding GEDIR and MFR methods which are the first localized algorithms (other than full flooding) to guarantee the message delivery (in a collision-free environment). We show that the directional routing methods are not loopfree, while the GEDIR and MFR-based methods are inherently loop free. The simulation experiments, with static random graphs, show that GEDIR and MFR have similar success rates, which is low for low degree graphs and high for high degree ones. When successful, their hop counts are near the performance of the shortest path algorithm. Hybrid single-path/flooding GEDIR and MFR methods have low communication overheads. The results are also confirmed by experiments with moving nodes and MAC layer. Index TermsÐRouting, wireless networks, distributed algorithms, shortest path, broadcasting 1

und the perimeter of the region. By keeping state only about the local topology, GPSR scales better in per-router state than shortest-path and ad-hoc routing protocols as the number of network destinations increases. Under mobility's frequent topology changes, GPSR can use local topology information to find correct new routes quickly. We describe the GPSR protocol, and use extensive simulation of mobile wireless networks to compare its performance with that of Dynamic Source Routing. Our simulations demonstrate GPSR's iii scalability on densely deployed wireless networks. iv Contents 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Metrics for Evaluating Routing Scalability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1.2 Traditional Shortest-Path Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.3 Ad-Hoc Routing Algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 1.4 Techniques for Routing Scalability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 1.5 Applica

Recent availability of small inexpensive low power GPS receivers and techniques for finding relative coordinates based on signal strengths, and the need for the design of power efficient and scalable networks, provided justification for applying position based routing methods in ad hoc networks. A number of such algorithms were developed in last few years, in addition to few basic methods proposed about fifteen years ago. This article surveys known routing methods, and provides their taxonomy in terms of a number of characteristics: loop-free behavior, distributed operation (localized, global or zonal), path strategy (single path, multi-path or flooding based), metrics used (hop count, power or cost), memorization (memoryless or memorizing past traffic), guaranteed delivery, scalability, and robustness (strategies to handle the position deviation due to the dynamicity of the network). We also briefly discuss relevant issues such as physical requirements, experimental design, location updates, QoS, congestion, scheduling node activity, topology construction, broadcasting and network capacity.

Routing of packets in a mobile ad-hoc network with a large number... this paper is a routing protocol that makes use of location information to reduce routing overhead. However, unlike other position-based routing protocols, BLR does not require nodes to periodically broadcast Hello-messages (called beaconing), and thus avoids drawbacks such as extensive use of scarce battery-power, interferences with regular data transmission, and performance degradation. BLR selects a forwarding node in a distributed manner among all its neighboring nodes with having information neither about their positions nor even about their existence. Data packets are broadcasted and the protocol takes care that just one of the receiving nodes forwards the packet. Optimized forwarding is achieved by applying a concept of Dynamic Forwarding Delay (DFD). Consequently, the node which computes the shortest forwarding delay relays the packet first. This forwarding is detected by the other nodes and suppresses them to relay the same packet any further. Analytical results and simulation experiments indicate that BLR provides efficient and robust routing in highly dynamic mobile ad-hoc networks.

We consider online routing algorithms for finding paths between the vertices of plane graphs.

Since sensor networks can be composed of a very large number of nodes, the developed protocols for these networks must be scalable. Moreover, these protocols must be designed to prolong the battery lifetime of the nodes. Typical existing routing techniques for ad hoc networks are known not to scale well. On the other hand, the so-called geographical routing algorithms are known to be scalable but their energy efficiency has never been extensively and comparatively studied. For this reason, a novel analytical framework is introduced. In a geographical routing algorithm, the packets are forwarded by a node to its neighbor based on their respective positions. The proposed framework allows to analyze the relationship between the energy efficiency of the routing tasks and the extension of the range of the topology knowledge for each node. The leading forwarding rules for geographical routing are compared in this framework, and the energy efficiency of each of them is studied. Moreover Partial Topology Knowledge Forwarding, a new forwarding scheme, is introduced. A wider topology knowledge can improve the energy efficiency of the routing tasks but can increase the cost of topology information due to signaling packets that each node must transmit and receive to acquire this information, especially in networks with high mobility. The problem of determining the optimal Knowledge Range for each node to make energy efficient geographical routing decisions is tackled by Integer Linear Programming. It is demonstrated that the problem is intrinsically localized, i.e., a limited knowledge of the topology is sufficient to take energy efficient forwarding decisions, and that the proposed forwarding scheme outperforms the others in typical application scenarios. For online solution of th...

Since ad hoc and sensor networks can be composed of a very large number of devices, the scalability of network protocols is a major design concern. Furthermore, network protocols must be designed to prolong the battery lifetime of the devices. However, most existing routing techniques for ad hoc networks are known not to scale well. On the other hand, the so-called geographical routing algorithms are known to be scalable but their energy efficiency has never been extensively and comparatively studied. In a geographical routing algorithm, data packets are forwarded by a node to its neighbor based on their respective positions. The neighborhood of each node is constituted by the nodes that lie within a certain radio range. Thus, from the perspective of a node forwarding a packet, the next hop depends on the width of the neighborhood it perceives. The analytical framework proposed in this paper allows to analyze the relationship between the energy