Design of a reliability-based source routing protocol for wireless mobile Ad Hoc networks

Abstract

This paper presents a Reliability-based Source Routing (RSR) protocol for mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs). RSR works as follows: Before sending a Route Reply (RREP) packet on a preferred path, the destination validates the discovered path by sending an encrypted Probe packet to the source. If the source node receives the Probe packet, it sends back an Acknowledgment back to the destination. If the Acknowledgment packet is received, the destination sends the RREP packet. Otherwise, the destination chooses the path that has the largest Reliability Metric. The Reliability Metric of a path is the minimum of the Reliability Metric of the constituent nodes of the path. The Reliability Metric of a node (a measure of trust) is updated based on the periodic encrypted beacon exchange, propagation of the Route Request (RREQ), RREP and data packets. The above procedure is repeated until a route can or cannot be discovered. © 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.