Load Balanced Coding Aware Multipath Routing for Wireless Mesh Networks

Abstract

The growth of network coding opportunitiesis considered the unique optimization goal by mostcurrent network coding based routing algorithms for wirelessmesh networks. This usually results in flows aggregationproblem in areas with coding opportunities, and degradesthe network performance. This paper proposes aLoad balanced coding aware multipath routing (LCMR)for wireless mesh networks. To facilitate the evaluation ofdiscovered multiple paths and the tradeoffs between codingopportunity and load balancing, a novel routing metric,Load balanced coding aware routing metric (LCRM) ispresented, which considers the load degree of nodes whendetects coding opportunities. LCMR could spread trafficover multipath to further balance load. Simulation results demonstrate that LCMR could evenly spread the traffic over the network with increasing network throughput in a heavy load at the expense of some coding opportunities.