RECOMAC: a cross-layer cooperative network protocol for wireless ad hoc networks

A novel decentralized cross-layer multi-hop cooperative protocol, namely, Routing Enabled Cooperative Medium Access Control (RECOMAC) is proposed for wireless ad hoc networks. The protocol architecture makes use of cooperative forwarding methods, in which coded packets are forwarded via opportunistically formed cooperative sets within a region, as RECOMAC spans the physical, medium access control (MAC) and routing layers. Randomized coding is exploited at the physical layer to realize cooperative transmissions, and cooperative forwarding is implemented for routing functionality, which is submerged into the MAC layer, while the overhead for MAC and route set up is minimized. RECOMAC is shown to provide dramatic performance improvements of eight times higher throughput and one tenth of end-to-end delay than that of the conventional architecture in practical wireless mesh networks

A cross layer multi hop network architecture for wireless Ad Hoc networks

In this paper, a novel decentralized cross-layer multi-hop cooperative network architecture is presented. Our architecture involves the design of a simple yet efficient cooperative flooding scheme,two decentralized opportunistic cooperative forwarding mechanisms as well as the design of Routing Enabled Cooperative Medium Access Control (RECOMAC) protocol that spans and incorporates the physical, medium access control (MAC) and routing layers for improving the performance of multihop communication. The proposed architecture exploits randomized coding at the physical layer to realize cooperative diversity. Randomized coding alleviates relay selection and actuation mechanisms,and therefore reduces the coordination among the relays. The coded packets are forwarded via opportunistically formed cooperative sets within a region, without communication among the relays and without establishing a prior route. In our architecture, routing layer functionality is submerged into the MAC layer to provide seamless cooperative communication while the messaging overhead to set up routes, select and actuate relays is minimized. RECOMAC is shown to provide dramatic performance improvements, such as eight times higher throughput and ten times lower end-to-end delay as well as reduced overhead, as compared to networks based on well-known IEEE 802.11 and Ad hoc On Demand Distance Vector (AODV) protocols

Secure Routing in Wireless Mesh Networks

Wireless mesh networks (WMNs) have emerged as a promising concept to meet the challenges in next-generation networks such as providing flexible, adaptive, and reconfigurable architecture while offering cost-effective solutions to the service providers. Unlike traditional Wi-Fi networks, with each access point (AP) connected to the wired network, in WMNs only a subset of the APs are required to be connected to the wired network. The APs that are connected to the wired network are called the Internet gateways (IGWs), while the APs that do not have wired connections are called the mesh routers (MRs). The MRs are connected to the IGWs using multi-hop communication. The IGWs provide access to conventional clients and interconnect ad hoc, sensor, cellular, and other networks to the Internet. However, most of the existing routing protocols for WMNs are extensions of protocols originally designed for mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) and thus they perform sub-optimally. Moreover, most routing protocols for WMNs are designed without security issues in mind, where the nodes are all assumed to be honest. In practical deployment scenarios, this assumption does not hold. This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of security issues in WMNs and then particularly focuses on secure routing in these networks. First, it identifies security vulnerabilities in the medium access control (MAC) and the network layers. Various possibilities of compromising data confidentiality, data integrity, replay attacks and offline cryptanalysis are also discussed. Then various types of attacks in the MAC and the network layers are discussed. After enumerating the various types of attacks on the MAC and the network layer, the chapter briefly discusses on some of the preventive mechanisms for these attacks.Comment: 44 pages, 17 figures, 5 table

A Cross-Layer Design Based on Geographic Information for Cooperative Wireless Networks

Most of geographic routing approaches in wireless ad hoc and sensor networks do not take into consideration the medium access control (MAC) and physical layers when designing a routing protocol. In this paper, we focus on a cross-layer framework design that exploits the synergies between network, MAC, and physical layers. In the proposed CoopGeo, we use a beaconless forwarding scheme where the next hop is selected through a contention process based on the geographic position of nodes. We optimize this Network-MAC layer interaction using a cooperative relaying technique with a relay selection scheme also based on geographic information in order to improve the system performance in terms of reliability.Comment: in 2010 IEEE 71st Vehicular Technology Conference, 201

Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks

In this chapter, we present a literature survey of an emerging, cutting-edge, and multi-disciplinary field of research at the intersection of Robotics and Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) which we refer to as Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks (RWSN). We define a RWSN as an autonomous networked multi-robot system that aims to achieve certain sensing goals while meeting and maintaining certain communication performance requirements, through cooperative control, learning and adaptation. While both of the component areas, i.e., Robotics and WSN, are very well-known and well-explored, there exist a whole set of new opportunities and research directions at the intersection of these two fields which are relatively or even completely unexplored. One such example would be the use of a set of robotic routers to set up a temporary communication path between a sender and a receiver that uses the controlled mobility to the advantage of packet routing. We find that there exist only a limited number of articles to be directly categorized as RWSN related works whereas there exist a range of articles in the robotics and the WSN literature that are also relevant to this new field of research. To connect the dots, we first identify the core problems and research trends related to RWSN such as connectivity, localization, routing, and robust flow of information. Next, we classify the existing research on RWSN as well as the relevant state-of-the-arts from robotics and WSN community according to the problems and trends identified in the first step. Lastly, we analyze what is missing in the existing literature, and identify topics that require more research attention in the future

Cooperative Medium Access Mechanisms and Service-oriented Routing in Multi-hop Wireless Networks

Doktorgradsavhandling i informasjons- og kommunikasjonsteknologi, Universitetet i Agder, Grimstad, 2011Multi-hop wireless networks have been regarded as a promising path towards future wireless communication landscape. In the past decade, most related work has been performed in the context of mobile ad hoc networks. In very recent years, however, much effort has been shifted to more static networks such as wireless mesh networks and wireless sensor networks. While significant progress has been achieved through these years, both theoretically and experimentally, challenges still exist in various aspects of these networks. For instance, how to use multi-hop networks as a means for providing broadband Internet services with reliability and balanced load remains as a challenging task. As the number of end-users is increasing rapidly and more and more users are enjoying multimedia services, how to provide Quality of Service (QoS) with user satisfaction in such networks remains also as a hot topic. Meanwhile, another direction which has recently attracted lots of efforts in the international research community is the introduction of cooperative communications. Cooperative communications based on relaying nodes are capable of improving network performance in terms of increased spectral and power efficiency, extended network coverage, balanced QoS, infrastructure-less deployment, etc. Cooperation may happen at different communication layers, at the physical layer where the received signal is retransmitted and at the MAC and routing layers where a packet is forwarded to the next hop in a coordinated manner towards the destination, respectively. However, without joint consideration and design of physical layer, MAC layer and network layer, the benefit of cooperative communication cannot be exploited to the maximum extent. In addition, how to extend one-hop cooperative communication into multi-hop wireless network scenarios remains as an almost un-chartered research frontier. In this dissertation, we enhance the state of the art technologies in the field of multi-hop wireless networks from a layered perspective. While efficient scheduling mechanisms are proposed at the MAC layer, elaborate routing protocols are devised at the network layer. More specifically, by taking into account of cross layer design we cope with network congestion problems in wireless mesh networks mainly at the network layer. In order to further improve the performance of cooperative wireless networks, we propose a contention-based cooperative MAC protocol in the presence of multiple relay nodes. Since a large majority of existing cooperative MAC protocols are designed based on widely-used IEEE 802.11 MAC protocol which exhibits inherent design constraint when applied in multi-hop wireless networks, it is imperative to develop a novel cooperative MAC protocol which is appropriate for multi-hop network scenarios. Next, we propose a TDMA-based MAC protocol supporting cooperative communications in static multi-hop wireless networks. Furthermore, a cooperative lifetime maximization MAC protocol is proposed to cope with the energy hole problem in wireless sensor networks

Computational Intelligence Inspired Data Delivery for Vehicle-to-Roadside Communications

We propose a vehicle-to-roadside communication protocol based on distributed clustering where a coalitional game approach is used to stimulate the vehicles to join a cluster, and a fuzzy logic algorithm is employed to generate stable clusters by considering multiple metrics of vehicle velocity, moving pattern, and signal qualities between vehicles. A reinforcement learning algorithm with game theory based reward allocation is employed to guide each vehicle to select the route that can maximize the whole network performance. The protocol is integrated with a multi-hop data delivery virtualization scheme that works on the top of the transport layer and provides high performance for multi-hop end-to-end data transmissions. We conduct realistic computer simulations to show the performance advantage of the protocol over other approaches