A taxonomy and evaluation for developing 802.11‐based wireless mesh network testbeds

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/92433/1/dac1299.pd

Virtual Communication Stack: Towards Building Integrated Simulator of Mobile Ad Hoc Network-based Infrastructure for Disaster Response Scenarios

Responses to disastrous events are a challenging problem, because of possible damages on communication infrastructures. For instance, after a natural disaster, infrastructures might be entirely destroyed. Different network paradigms were proposed in the literature in order to deploy adhoc network, and allow dealing with the lack of communications. However, all these solutions focus only on the performance of the network itself, without taking into account the specificities and heterogeneity of the components which use it. This comes from the difficulty to integrate models with different levels of abstraction. Consequently, verification and validation of adhoc protocols cannot guarantee that the different systems will work as expected in operational conditions. However, the DEVS theory provides some mechanisms to allow integration of models with different natures. This paper proposes an integrated simulation architecture based on DEVS which improves the accuracy of ad hoc infrastructure simulators in the case of disaster response scenarios.Comment: Preprint. Unpublishe

A survey of evaluation platforms for ad hoc routing protocols: a resilience perspective

Routing protocols allow for the spontaneous formation of wireless multi-hop networks without dedicated infrastructure, also known as ad hoc networks. Despite significant technological advances, difficulties associated with the evaluation of ad hoc routing protocols under realistic conditions, still hamper their maturation and significant roll out in real world deployments. In particular, the resilience evaluation of ad hoc routing protocols is essential to determine their ability of keeping the routing service working despite the presence of changes, such as accidental faults or malicious ones (attacks). However, the resilience dimension is not always addressed by the evaluation platforms that are in charge of assessing these routing protocols. In this paper, we provide a survey covering current state-of-the-art evaluation platforms in the domain of ad hoc routing protocols paying special attention to the resilience dimension. The goal is threefold. First, we identify the most representative evaluation platforms and the routing protocols they have evaluated. Then, we analyse the experimental methodologies followed by such evaluation platforms. Finally, we create a taxonomy to characterise experimental properties of such evaluation platforms.This work is partially supported by the Spanish Project ARENES (TIN2012-38308-C02-01), the ANR French Project AMORES (ANR-11-INSE-010), and the Intel Doctoral Student Honour Programme 2012.Friginal López, J.; Andrés Martínez, DD.; Ruiz García, JC.; Martínez Raga, M. (2014). A survey of evaluation platforms for ad hoc routing protocols: a resilience perspective. Computer Networks. 75(A):395-413. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comnet.2014.09.010S39541375

Toward Constructive Relay-Based Cooperative Routing in MANETs

Frequent link breaks (due to node mobility) and quick exhaustion of energy (due to limited battery volume) are two major problems impacting on the flexibility in mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). Cooperative communication in MANETs has become an appealing topic, as it can improve system capacity and energy efficiency. In spite of such advantages of cooperative communication, some issues still remain, such as the lack of a systematically designed cooperative routing scheme (including route discovery, route reply, route enhancement, and cooperative data forwarding), facilitation of cooperative communication in mobility resistance, and route selection (jointly considering energy consumption, energy-harvesting ability, and link break probability). Driven by the above concerns, we propose a novel Constructive-Relay-based CooPerative Routing (CRCPR) protocol in this paper. Using topological information stored and maintained in a COoPerative Table and Relay Table, CRCPR enhances resilience to mitigate the mobility issue by self-managing to construct adequate relays for data forwarding. Furthermore, assuming nodes are mostly battery operated, CRCPR proposes a new route selection mechanism, which takes into account energy consumption, energy harvesting, and link break probability, to determine an appropriate route across a network. Simulation results show the robustness of CRCPR against node mobility, further with improvement for up to 60% network throughput and 40% prolonged network lifetime

Routing Protocols for Meshed Communication, Networks Targeting Communication Quality of Service (QoS) in Rural Areas

Rural areas in Africa often have poor telecommunication infrastructure. Mobile phones, if available, are frequently unaffordable to most users. Wireless mesh networks (WMNs) offer an alternative possibility of low cost voice and data communications. The focus of this research is a laboratory study of WMNs that mimic conditions found in rural areas. This work investigates routing strategies for the Mesh Potato (MP). The MP is an effective alternative communication technology that has minimal configuration requirements, low cost of deployment, low power consumption and resilience that make it an attractive choice for rural areas. The MP runs a new mesh networking algorithm called the better approach to mobile ad hoc networking (B.A.T.M.A.N or Batman). This allows a WMN to be established in which users can use plain old telephones to talk to each other using Voice over IP (VoIP). Batman daemon (Batmand) is the implementation of Batman algorithm used by the MP. Batmand is a minimalistic routing protocol which performs well in laboratory experiments. The question raised is whether adding more service specific routing metrics improve the quality of service (QoS) observed in Batmand network in practice. The research investigates delay, packet loss, throughput and jitter as performance parameters (metrics) that may serve as options to improve the simplistic Batman algorithms route selection process. These metrics are essential for QoS in voice- and data-sensitive networks. Specific focus was given to delay and it is the metric added to Batmand. In addition the research examines how well the different applications such as voice and data are supported on the Batmand network under different routing scenarios. The research approach adopted in this dissertation was experimental and an indoor testbed was created to replicate the basic scenarios encountered in the rural environment. The essential characteristics found in the Mdumbi region of the Eastern Cape, South Africa, were taken as a case study in this dissertation. The testbed was used to compare the original Batman algorithm implemented as Batmand, referred to here as O-Batmand, routing protocol and the resultant Batmand version obtained from the addition of the delay-routing metric called modified Batmand (M-Batmand). The research produced a number of findings. As the number of hops increased the per-formance of the network decreased for both protocols. O-Batmand is well suited for the task of routing packets inside a wireless network. It is designed and works for voice packets and supports data services. This is also true for the M-Batmand implementation. M-Batmand was developed as an improvement to the O-Batmand implementation at the cost of increased complexity, experienced by the protocol through modifications of its route selection process. The modification involved adding network delay values to its route selection process. This addition resulted in a protocol that is delay sensitive; however, the overall performance gains were inexistent. The main conclusions drawn from this study are that O-Batmand cannot be modified to include additional metrics and be expected to improve its performance. Second conclusion is that M-Batmand did not improve the overall performance of the O-Batmand protocol. The addition of the delay metric actually hindered O-Batmand's performance to the extent that no overall performance gains were realised. Sources of performance degradations are: increased overhead, from added delay data, in the network control packets called originator messages (OGMs). M-Batmand performs calculation which O-Batmand did not increasing CPU cycle needs. Lastly upon further internal protocol investigation it is seen that the rate of route delay data updates is slower than the original metric used by the protocol. This creates route fluctuations as route selection process will change when the updated delay values are added and change again when there are not as the network obtains the updated delay data. Both protocols support voice and data, however, the results show that the quality of the network deteriorates in the testbed with increasing hops. This affects voice more so then it does data as routes become more unstable with each increasing hop. Further Batmand is best at supporting voice and data as it outperforms M-Batmand in the laboratory experiments conducted. This dissertation argues that while there may exist one or a combination of metrics amongst the researched list (delay, packet loss, throughput and jitter) that may actually improve the performance of the protocol, it is extremely hard to realize such gains in practice

Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationNetwork emulation has become an indispensable tool for the conduct of research in networking and distributed systems. It offers more realism than simulation and more control and repeatability than experimentation on a live network. However, emulation testbeds face a number of challenges, most prominently realism and scale. Because emulation allows the creation of arbitrary networks exhibiting a wide range of conditions, there is no guarantee that emulated topologies reflect real networks; the burden of selecting parameters to create a realistic environment is on the experimenter. While there are a number of techniques for measuring the end-to-end properties of real networks, directly importing such properties into an emulation has been a challenge. Similarly, while there exist numerous models for creating realistic network topologies, the lack of addresses on these generated topologies has been a barrier to using them in emulators. Once an experimenter obtains a suitable topology, that topology must be mapped onto the physical resources of the testbed so that it can be instantiated. A number of restrictions make this an interesting problem: testbeds typically have heterogeneous hardware, scarce resources which must be conserved, and bottlenecks that must not be overused. User requests for particular types of nodes or links must also be met. In light of these constraints, the network testbed mapping problem is NP-hard. Though the complexity of the problem increases rapidly with the size of the experimenter's topology and the size of the physical network, the runtime of the mapper must not; long mapping times can hinder the usability of the testbed. This dissertation makes three contributions towards improving realism and scale in emulation testbeds. First, it meets the need for realistic network conditions by creating Flexlab, a hybrid environment that couples an emulation testbed with a live-network testbed, inheriting strengths from each. Second, it attends to the need for realistic topologies by presenting a set of algorithms for automatically annotating generated topologies with realistic IP addresses. Third, it presents a mapper, assign, that is capable of assigning experimenters' requested topologies to testbeds' physical resources in a manner that scales well enough to handle large environments

Design and implementation of simulation tools, protocols and architectures to support service platforms on vehicular networks

Tesis por compendioProducts related with Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) are becoming a reality on our roads. All car manufacturers are starting to include Internet access in their vehicles and to integrate smartphones directly from the dashboard, but more and more services will be introduced in the near future. Connectivity through "vehicular networks" will become a cornerstone of every new proposal, and offering an adequate quality of service is obviously desirable. However, a lot of work is needed for vehicular networks to offer performances similar to those of the wired networks. Vehicular networks can be characterized by two main features: high variability due to mobility levels that can reach up to 250 kilometers per hour, and heterogeneity, being that various competing versions from different vendors have and will be released. Therefore, to make the deployment of efficient services possible, an extensive study must be carried out and adequate tools must be proposed and developed. This PhD thesis addresses the service deployment problem in these networks at three different levels: (i) the physical and link layer, showing an exhaustive analysis of the physical channel and models; (ii) the network layer, proposing a forwarding protocol for IP packets; and (iii) the transport layer, where protocols are proposed to improve data delivery. First of all, the two main wireless technologies used in vehicular networks where studied and modeled, namely the 802.11 family of standards, particularly 802.11p, and the cellular networks focusing on LTE. Since 802.11p is a quite mature standard, we defined (i) a propagation and attenuation model capable of replicating the transmission range and the fading behavior of real 802.11p devices, both in line-of-sight conditions and when obstructed by small obstacles, and (ii) a visibility model able to deal with large obstacles, such as buildings and houses, in a realistic manner. Additionally, we proposed a model based on high-level performance indicators (bandwidth and delay) for LTE, which makes application validation and evaluation easier. At the network layer, a hybrid protocol called AVE is proposed for packet forwarding by switching among a set of standard routing strategies. Depending on the specific scenario, AVE selects one out of four different routing solutions: a) two-hop direct delivery, b) Dynamic MANET On-demand (DYMO), c) greedy georouting, and d) store-carry-and-forward technique, to dynamically adapt its behavior to the specific situation. At the transport layer, we proposed a content delivery protocol for reliable and bidirectional unicast communication in lossy links that improves content delivery in situations where the wireless network is the bottleneck. It has been designed, validated, optimized, and its performance has been analyzed in terms of throughput and resource efficiency. Finally, at system level, we propose an edge-assisted computing model that allows reducing the response latency of several queries by placing a computing unit at the network edge. This way, traffic traversal through the Internet is avoided when not needed. This scheme could be used in both 802.11p and cellular networks, and in this thesis we decided to focus on its evaluation using LTE networks. The platform presented in this thesis combines all the individual efforts to create a single efficient platform. This new environment could be used by any provider to improve the quality of the user experience obtainable through the proposed vehicular network-based services.Los productos relacionados con los Sistemas Inteligentes de Transporte (ITS) se están transformando en una realidad en nuestras carreteras. Todos los fabricantes de coches comienzan a incluir acceso a internet en sus vehículos y a facilitar su integración con los teléfonos móviles, pero más y más servicios se introducirán en el futuro. La conectividad usando las "redes vehiculares" se convertirá en la piedra angular de cada nueva propuesta, y ofrecer una calidad de servicio adecuada será, obviamente, deseable. Sin embargo, se necesita una gran cantidad de trabajo para que las redes vehiculares ofrezcan un rendimiento similar al de las redes cableadas. Las redes vehiculares quedan definidas por sus dos características básicas: alto dinamismo, pues los nodos pueden alcanzar una velocidad relativa de más de 250 km/h; y heterogeneidad, por la gran cantidad de propuestas diferentes que los fabricantes están lanzando al mercado. Por ello, para hacer posible el despliegue de servicios sobre ellas, se impone la necesidad de hacer un estudio en profundidad de este entorno, y deben de proponerse y desarrollarse las herramientas adecuadas. Esta tesis ataca la problemática del despliegue de servicios en estas redes a tres niveles diferentes: (i) el nivel físico y de enlace, mostrando varios análisis en profundidad del medio físico y modelos derivados para su simulación; (ii) el nivel de red, proponiendo un protocolo de difusión de la información para los paquetes IP; y (iii) el nivel de transporte, donde otros protocolos son propuestos para mejorar el rendimiento del transporte de datos. En primer lugar, se han estudiado y modelado las dos principales tecnologías inalámbricas que se utilizan para la comunicación en redes vehiculares, la rama de estándares 802.11, en concreto 802.11p; y la comunicación celular, en particular LTE. Dado que el estándar 802.11p es un estándar bastante maduro, nos centramos en crear (i) un modelo de propagación y atenuación capaz de replicar el rango de transmisión de dispositivos 802.11p reales, en condiciones de visión directa y obstrucción por pequeños obstáculos, y (ii) un modelo de visibilidad capaz de simular el efecto de grandes obstáculos, como son los edifcios, de una manera realista. Además, proponemos un modelo basado en indicadores de rendimiento de alto nivel (ancho de banda y retardo) para LTE, que facilita la validación y evaluación de aplicaciones. En el plano de red, se propone un protocolo híbrido, llamado AVE, para el encaminamiento y reenvío de paquetes usando un conjunto de estrategias estándar de enrutamiento. Dependiendo del escenario, AVE elige entre cuatro estrategias diferentes: a) entrega directa a dos saltos, b) Dynamic MANET On-demand (DYMO) c) georouting voraz, y d) una técnica store-carry-and- forward, para adaptar su comportamiento dinámicamente a cada situación. En el plano de transporte, se propone un protocolo bidireccional de distribución de contenidos en canales con pérdidas que mejora la entrega de contenidos en situaciones en las que la red es un cuello de botella, como las redes inalámbricas. Ha sido diseñado, validado, optimizado, y su rendimiento ha sido analizado en términos de productividad y eficiencia en la utilización de recursos. Finalmente, a nivel de sistema, proponemos un modelo de computación asistida que permite reducir la latencia en la respuesta a muchas consultas colocando una unidad de computación en el borde de la red, i.e., la red de acceso. Este esquema podría ser usado en redes basadas en 802.11p y en redes celulares, si bien en esta tesis decidimos centrarnos en su evaluación usando redes LTE. La plataforma presentada en esta tesis combina todos los esfuerzos individuales para crear una plataforma única y eficiente. Este nuevo entorno puede ser usado por cualquier proveedor para mejorar la calidad de la experiencia de usuario en los servicios desplegados sobre redes vehiculares.Els productes relacionats amb els sistemes intel · ligents de transport (ITS) s'estan transformant en una realitat en les nostres carreteres. Tots els fabri- cants de cotxes comencen a incloure accés a internet en els vehicles i a facilitar- ne la integració amb els telèfons mòbils, però en el futur més i més serveis s'hi introduiran. La connectivitat usant les xarxes vehicular esdevindrà la pedra angular de cada nova proposta, i oferir una qualitat de servei adequada serà, òbviament, desitjable. No obstant això, es necessita una gran quantitat de treball perquè les xarxes vehiculars oferisquen un rendiment similar al de les xarxes cablejades. Les xarxes vehiculars queden definides per dues característiques bàsiques: alt dinamisme, ja que els nodes poden arribar a una velocitat relativa de més de 250 km/h; i heterogeneïtat, per la gran quantitat de propostes diferents que els fabricants estan llançant al mercat. Per això, per a fer possible el desplegament de serveis sobre aquestes xarxes, s'imposa la necessitat de fer un estudi en profunditat d'aquest entorn, i cal proposar i desenvolupar les eines adequades. Aquesta tesi ataca la problemàtica del desplegament de serveis en aquestes xarxes a tres nivells diferents: (i) el nivell físic i d'enllaç , mostrant diverses anàlisis en profunditat del medi físic i models derivats per simular-lo; (ii) el nivell de xarxa, proposant un protocol de difusió de la informació per als paquets IP; i (iii) el nivell de transport, on es proposen altres protocols per a millorar el rendiment del transport de dades. En primer lloc, s'han estudiat i modelat les dues principals tecnologies sense fils que s'utilitzen per a la comunicació en xarxes vehiculars, la branca d'estàndards 802.11, en concret 802.11p; i la comunicació cel · lular, en partic- ular LTE. Atès que l'estàndard 802.11p és un estàndard bastant madur, ens centrem a crear (i) un model de propagació i atenuació capaç de replicar el rang de transmissió de dispositius 802.11p reals, en condicions de visió directa i obstrucció per petits obstacles, i (ii) un model de visibilitat capaç de simular l'efecte de grans obstacles, com són els edificis, d'una manera realista. A més, proposem un model basat en indicadors de rendiment d'alt nivell (ample de banda i retard) per a LTE, que facilita la validació i l'avaluació d'aplicacions. En el pla de xarxa, es proposa un protocol híbrid, anomenat AVE, per a l'encaminament i el reenviament de paquets usant un conjunt d'estratègies estàndard d'encaminament. Depenent de l'escenari , AVE tria entre quatre estratègies diferents: a) lliurament directe a dos salts, b) Dynamic MANET On-demand (DYMO) c) georouting voraç, i d) una tècnica store-carry-and- forward, per a adaptar-ne el comportament dinàmicament a cada situació. En el pla de transport, es proposa un protocol bidireccional de distribució de continguts en canals amb pèrdues que millora el lliurament de continguts en situacions en què la xarxa és un coll de botella, com les xarxes sense fils. Ha sigut dissenyat, validat, optimitzat, i el seu rendiment ha sigut analitzat en termes de productivitat i eficiència en la utilització de recursos. Finalment, a nivell de sistema, proposem un model de computació assistida que permet reduir la latència en la resposta a moltes consultes col · locant una unitat de computació a la vora de la xarxa, és a dir, la xarxa d'accés. Aquest esquema podria ser usat en xarxes basades en 802.11p i en xarxes cel · lulars, si bé en aquesta tesi decidim centrar-nos en la seua avaluació usant xarxes LTE. La plataforma presentada en aquesta tesi combina tots els esforços indi- viduals per a crear una plataforma única i eficient. Aquest nou entorn pot ser usat per qualsevol proveïdor per a millorar la qualitat de l'experiència d'usuari en els serveis desplegats sobre xarxes vehiculars.Báguena Albaladejo, M. (2017). Design and implementation of simulation tools, protocols and architectures to support service platforms on vehicular networks [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/85333TESISCompendi

Improving P2P streaming in Wireless Community Networks

Wireless Community Networks (WCNs) are bottom-up broadband networks empowering people with their on-line communication means. Too often, however, services tailored for their characteristics are missing, with the consequence that they have worse performance than what they could. We present here an adaptation of an Open Source P2P live streaming platform that works efficiently, and with good application-level quality, over WCNs. WCNs links are normally symmetric (unlike standard ADSL access), and a WCN topology is local and normally flat (contrary to the global Internet), so that the P2P overlay used for video distribution can be adapted to the underlaying network characteristics. We exploit this observation to derive overlay building strategies that make use of cross-layer information to reduce the impact of the P2P streaming on the WCN while maintaining good application performance. We experiment with a real application in real WCN nodes, both in the Community-Lab provided by the CONFINE EU Project and within an emulation framework based on Mininet, where we can build larger topologies and interact more efficiently with the mesh underlay, which is unfortunately not accessible in Community-Lab. The results show that, with the overlay building strategies proposed, the P2P streaming applications can reduce the load on the WCN to about one half, also equalizing the load on links. At the same time the delivery rate and delay of video chunks are practically unaffected. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Analysis, evaluation and improvement of RT-WMP for real-time and QoS wireless communication: Applications in confined environments

En los ultimos años, la innovación tecnológica, la característica de flexibilidad y el rápido despligue de las redes inalámbricas, han favorecido la difusión de la redes móviles ad-hoc (MANETs), capaces de ofrecer servicios para tareas específicas entre nodos móviles. Los aspectos relacionados al dinamismo de la topología móvil y el acceso a un medio compartido por naturaleza hacen que sea preciso enfrentarse a clases de problemas distintos de los relacionados con la redes cableadas, atrayendo de este modo el interés de la comunidad científica. Las redes ad-hoc suelen soportar tráfico con garantía de servicio mínimo y la mayor parte de las propuestas presentes en literatura tratan de dar garantías de ancho de banda o minimizar el retardo de los mensajes. Sin embargo hay situaciones en las que estas garantías no son suficientes. Este es el caso de los sistemas que requieren garantías mas fuertes en la entrega de los mensajes, como es el caso de los sistemas de tiempo real donde la pérdida o el retraso de un sólo mensaje puede provocar problemas graves. Otras aplicaciones como la videoconferencia, cada vez más extendidas, implican un tráfico de datos con requisitos diferentes, como la calidad de servicio (QoS). Los requisitos de tiempo real y de QoS añaden nuevos retos al ya exigente servicio de comunicación inalámbrica entre estaciones móviles de una MANET. Además, hay aplicaciones en las que hay que tener en cuenta algo más que el simple encaminamiento de los mensajes. Este es el caso de aplicaciones en entornos subterráneos, donde el conocimiento de la evolución de propagación de la señal entre los diferentes nodos puede ser útil para mejorar la calidad de servicio y mantener la conectividad en cada momento. A pesar de ésto, dentro del amplio abanicos de propuestas presente en la literatura, existen un conjunto de limitaciones que van de el mero uso de protocolos simulados a propuestas que no tienen en cuenta entornos no convencionales o que resultan aisladas desde el punto de vista de la integración en sistemas complejos. En esta tesis doctoral, se propone un estudio completo sobre un plataforma inalámbrica de tiempo real, utilizando el protocolo RT-WMP capaz de gestionar trafíco multimedia al mismo tiempo y adaptado al entorno de trabajo. Se propone una extensión para el soporte a los datos con calidad de servicio sin limitar las caractaristícas temporales del protocolo básico. Y con el fin de tener en cuenta el efecto de la propagación de la señal, se caracteriza el entorno por medio de un conjunto de restricciones de conectividad. La solución ha sido desarrollada y su validez ha sido demostrada extensamente en aplicaciones reales en entornos subterráneos, en redes malladas y aplicaciones robóticas

Resource-efficient strategies for mobile ad-hoc networking

The ubiquity and widespread availability of wireless mobile devices with ever increasing inter-connectivity (e. g. by means of Bluetooth, WiFi or UWB) have led to new and emerging next generation mobile communication paradigms, such as the Mobile Ad-hoc NETworks (MANETs). MANETs are differentiated from traditional mobile systems by their unique properties, e. g. unpredictable nodal location, unstable topology and multi-hop packet relay. The success of on-going research in communications involving MANETs has encouraged their applications in areas with stringent performance requirements such as the e-healthcare, e. g. to connect them with existing systems to deliver e-healthcare services anytime anywhere. However, given that the capacity of mobile devices is restricted by their resource constraints (e. g. computing power, energy supply and bandwidth), a fundamental challenge in MANETs is how to realize the crucial performance/Quality of Service (QoS) expectations of communications in a network of high dynamism without overusing the limited resources. A variety of networking technologies (e. g. routing, mobility estimation and connectivity prediction) have been developed to overcome the topological instability and unpredictability and to enable communications in MANETs with satisfactory performance or QoS. However, these technologies often feature a high consumption of power and/or bandwidth, which makes them unsuitable for resource constrained handheld or embedded mobile devices. In particular, existing strategies of routing and mobility characterization are shown to achieve fairly good performance but at the expense of excessive traffic overhead or energy consumption. For instance, existing hybrid routing protocols in dense MANETs are based in two-dimensional organizations that produce heavy proactive traffic. In sparse MANETs, existing packet delivery strategy often replicates too many copies of a packet for a QoS target. In addition, existing tools for measuring nodal mobility are based on either the GPS or GPS-free positioning systems, which incur intensive communications/computations that are costly for battery-powered terminals. There is a need to develop economical networking strategies (in terms of resource utilization) in delivering the desired performance/soft QoS targets. The main goal of this project is to develop new networking strategies (in particular, for routing and mobility characterization) that are efficient in terms of resource consumptions while being effective in realizing performance expectations for communication services (e. g. in the scenario of e-healthcare emergency) with critical QoS requirements in resource-constrained MANETs. The main contributions of the thesis are threefold: (1) In order to tackle the inefficient bandwidth utilization of hybrid service/routing discovery in dense MANETs, a novel "track-based" scheme is developed. The scheme deploys a one-dimensional track-like structure for hybrid routing and service discovery. In comparison with existing hybrid routing/service discovery protocols that are based on two-dimensional structures, the track-based scheme is more efficient in terms of traffic overhead (e. g. about 60% less in low mobility scenarios as shown in Fig. 3.4). Due to the way "provocative tracks" are established, the scheme has also the capability to adapt to the network traffic and mobility for a better performance. (2) To minimize the resource utilization of packet delivery in sparse MANETs where wireless links are intermittently connected, a store-and-forward based scheme, "adaptive multicopy routing", was developed for packet delivery in sparse mobile ad-hoc networks. Instead of relying on the source to control the delivery overhead as in the conventional multi-copy protocols, the scheme allows each intermediate node to independently decide whether to forward a packet according to the soft QoS target and local network conditions. Therefore, the scheme can adapt to varying networking situations that cannot be anticipated in conventional source-defined strategies and deliver packets for a specific QoS targets using minimum traffic overhead. ii (3) The important issue of mobility measurement that imposes heavy communication/computation burdens on a mobile is addressed with a set of resource-efficient "GPS-free" soluti ons, which provide mobility characterization with minimal resource utilization for ranging and signalling by making use of the information of the time-varying ranges between neighbouring mobile nodes (or groups of mobile nodes). The range-based solutions for mobility characterization consist of a new mobility metric for network-wide performance measurement, two velocity estimators for approximating the inter-node relative speeds, and a new scheme for characterizing the nodal mobility. The new metric and its variants are capable of capturing the mobility of a network as well as predicting the performance. The velocity estimators are used to measure the speed and orientation of a mobile relative to its neighbours, given the presence of a departing node. Based on the velocity estimators, the new scheme for mobility characterization is capable of characterizing the mobility of a node that are associated with topological stability, i. e. the node's speeds, orientations relative to its neighbouring nodes and its past epoch time. iiiBIOPATTERN EU Network of Excellence (EU Contract 508803