A New Protocol for Mobile Ad hoc Networks With Virtual Backbone Nodes

Abstract

A flat mobile ad hoc network has an inherent scalability limitation in terms of achievable network capacity. It is seen that when the network size increases, per node throughput of an ad hoc network rapidly decreases. This is due to the fact that in large scale networks, flat structure of networks results in long hop paths which are prone to breaks. These long hop paths can be avoided by using virtual nodes concept working as mobile backbone network (MBN). There are some specific virtual power capable nodes functionally more capable than ordinary nodes. In this paper, a new routing protocol for large scale networks with mobile virtual nodes has been proposed. This routing protocol uses different types of routing protocols which makes it easily extendable to support QoS as well. To establish the structure, some of the virtual nodes are elected to act as backbone nodes (BNs), which form the higher layer. Finally, the NS-2 network simulator has been used for the realistic simulation of the proposed protocol. The simulation results of the proposed routing protocol for networks of different sizes and mobility speeds show that the proposed routing protocol performs better compared to other protocols.