Cognitive Routing for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks

The purpose of this project is to investigate how the impact of relaying can be reduced in wireless ad hoc networks by examining routing strategies and network design that exploit heterogeneous node capabilities, including nodes that are able to assign variable amounts of bandwidth using cognitive radio techniques.

Wireless ad hoc networks have been suggested as a method of peer-to-peer communications, removing the need for fixed infrastructures. Such methods work well when the number of relay hops is small, but their efficiency falls rapidly in homogeneous ad hoc networks when the number of relay hops increases, due to relaying overheads. This lack of scalability has restricted the application of ad hoc networks to a few limited areas. It is anticipated that scalability can be improved significantly by the control of mutual interference between nodes and taking into account the variable capability of nodes to relay traffic. This can be achieved by replacing the conventional shortest path routing metric used in many routing algorithms, by a routing metric that takes into account a node’s impact on surrounding nodes, and which favours high-capability relay nodes that use directional antennas and advanced bandwidth assignment techniques. Thus routes will be selected which have the lowest impact on their surroundings and best relaying capabilities. It is expected that the project will exploit standard routing algorithms and techniques found in current/future transmission standards. IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.15.4, ZigBee and IEEE802.22 could be particularly useful.

A mixture of simulation and analysis will be used to assess performance, and it is expected that game theory and Markov analysis will be particularly important analytical tools. This work will integrate closely with other activities within the Group.

Key objectives

To develop routing metrics that have a minimum impact on other nodes and maximise relaying capability.
To investigate how cognitive radio techniques can be used with wireless ad hoc networks and how the resulting benefits can be incorporated into routing metrics to improve relaying capability and network scalability.
To explore how ad hoc network design and node capability impacts on performance.
To understand how directional antennas can be used to improve relaying performance.

Outputs

Routing metrics for heterogeneous ad hoc networks that minimise impact and improve scalability.
Simulations and analysis showing relative performance of the routing metrics for different types of ad hoc network design.
Contributions to conference and journal papers.

Cognitive Routing for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks

Key objectives

Outputs

Members

Dates

Research