A hierarchical virtual-backbone routing approach in ad hoc networks

This paper presents a hierarchical approach to routing in ad-hoc wireless networks using graph theoretic concepts. Ad hoc wireless networks provide a flexible and quick means of establishing wireless peer-to-peer communications. However, routing remains a challenging problem in an ad hoc network due to its multihop nature and dynamic network topology. In previous work, we have proposed an evolutionary approach, employing genetic algorithms, to constructing a stable connected dominating set that serves as a virtual backbone in an ad hoc wireless network. In this work, we present a two-level hierarchical routing strategy that serves to further improve the efficiency of the evolutionary virtual-backbone-based routing approach. The network is divided into groups of nodes called clusters. Within each cluster, there exists a self-organizing, dynamic virtual backbone that is constructed using a heuristic based on genetic algorithms. Between clusters, information is routed through gateway nodes. The overhead of computing and refreshing the virtual backbone for the entire network would be greatly reduced, particularly as the network size increases. This, in turn, improves the routing performance significantly. Through extensive simulations, we demonstrate the importance of clustering by showing that the clustered protocol outperforms the non-clustered evolutionary protocol especially for large networks.