A reconfigurable multicast routing protocol for mobile ad-hoc networks

Abstract

An infrastructure independent and self-organizing network where the mobile nodes are communicated with each other through wireless links is referred asMobile ad-hoc network. Amajor challenging task of mobile ad-hoc networks is Route maintenance due to some reasons such as frequent topological changes, packet collisions and bad channels which may cause some link breakages. Reconfigurable Virtual Backbone (RVB) construction and maintenance play a vital role, mainly in the multicast routing of mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs). In this paper, the issues in providing a reconfigurable virtual backbone with the lower overhead are investigated and here we come up with a solution and propose a Reconfigurable Multicast Routing Protocol (RMRP) for constructing a virtual backbone and generating an alternate path during link failures. In comparison with the existing backbone and link recovery protocols like Backbone Group Model (BGM), Hierarchical Virtual Backbone Construction (HVBC) protocol and Local Link Failure Recovery (LLFR) protocol, the proposed protocol yields effective results in constructing a reconfigurable virtual backbone and generating an on-demand alternate path with the minimized overhead, increasing packet delivery ratio, throughput, minimizing delay of transmission, energy consumption, and with the improved routing performance significantly.