Performance Study of a Cross-Layer Based Multipath Routing Protocol for IEEE 802.11e Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

Abstract

Communication over wireless links identifies significant challenges for routing protocols operating. This paper proposes a Cross-layer design based Multipath Routing Protocol (CMRP) for mobile ad hoc networks, by means of the node energy signal from the physical layer. The purpose is to optimize routing decision and path quality. The nodes’ mobility behavior is predicted using a notion of “Signal Fading Degree, SFD”. Especially, in combination of the IEEE 802.11e standard at the MAC layer, we determine that the IEEE 802.11e makes a significant contribution to performance improvement of CMRP. Performance evaluation of AODV in legacy 802.11 and CMRP in IEEE 802.11e shows that, as a function of speed of node mobility, a tremendous reduction achieved, in metrics such as the average end-to-end delay, route overhead, route discovery frequency, normalized routing load - almost more than 80%, 40%, 40%, and 40%. In the case of varying number of sessions, the reduction for route discovery frequency and normalized routing load are up to 70% and 80%.