Unity in Togetherness: A Review on Clustering Algorithms in Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks

This paper presents a novel review of various clustering algorithms used in the vehicular ad hoc networks (VANET). VANET is an emerging technology sharing a plethora of applications providing safety and contentment to the vehicle users. It is a vital part of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) which provides coherent and well organized communication between the vehicles like sending warning messages to avoid the accidents and fatal conditions. Peculiar traffic conditions and the dynamic topology of the network can be challenging for the timely delivery of the messages. Though VANETs presents a unique range of challenges for routing, on the other hand it equally presents solutions via clustering algorithms. Clustering can be useful in maintaining the stability and reliability of an ad-hoc network that results in performance enhancement. Clustering is basically a key technology in VANET that outperform the MANET clustering algorithms like 0lowest ID algorithm, maximum degree algorithm etc. that does not perform well on the pitch of VANET. Adding to the merit of vehicular ad-hoc networks, they have a good hand in accident avoidance, congestion detection, information dissemination etc. This paper is a reviewed comparative study of various clustering algorithms researched in recent years hence making it an easy task to examine the best algorithm for clustering in a particular situation.