Multicasting in ad hoc networks using NTP protocol

Mobile Ad-Hoc Network is an autonomous system of mobile nodes characterized by wireless links. The central challenge in the design of ad-hoc networks is the development of dynamic routing protocol that finds routes between mobile nodes. There are two types of data disseminations in a network, namely unicasting and multicasting. In this paper, we deal with multicasting, which is one to many data dissemination. Many multicast algorithms have already been proposed, but the major drawback with these algorithms is the excessive control overhead associated with them. Here, we present a new multicast algorithm, called Node Transition Probability based Multicast Routing (NTPMR) for mobile ad hoc networks, which presents the lowest control overhead when compared with the existing multicast protocols. The performance of this algorithm is evaluated in terms of quantitative metrics such as control overhead and packet delivery ratio.