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Routing protocols in wireless mesh networks:�Challenge & design considerations

University of Waterloo

2006

Presented by Sayanee at Papers We Love Singapore

Download the paper to read

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My undergraduate final year project 10 years ago

Position based routing protocol for Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET) �How can ships have Internet?

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Star vs Mesh topology

WiFi router + many laptops

Cell tower + many mobile

Bluetooth

Satellites

ZigBee

Z-Wave

LoRaWAN

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Advantages of a Wireless Mesh Network (WMN)

  • Last mile connectivity issue
  • No installation of large wires / fibres
  • Low cost of deployment
  • Rapid deployment
  • Self-organizing, self-optimizing, fault tolerant
  • Setup ad-hoc networks
  • Setup sensor networks

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Challenges in Wireless Mesh Network

  • Multi-hop point-to-point routing
    • Different from conventional wireless network
  • Demand for Quality of Service (QoS)
    • Resource management

​

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Different types of mesh networks

  • Mobility: mobile or immobile nodes���
  • Power: energy-constrained or non-energy constrained nodes���
  • Traffic: pattern

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Mesh network architecture elements

  1. Network gateway : access to wired infrastructure
  2. Access points : static, low failure, no power constraints
  3. Mobile nodes : vary in mobility computation, transmission, power

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Network coverage

Example:��South Korea’s IoT network

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Wireless mesh network characteristics

  1. Transmission medium
    1. Bandwidth
    2. Changes in link capacity
    3. Asymmetrical links
  2. Network deployment
    • Mobility
    • Hybrid: fixed wireless backbone + edge network of mobile nodes
  3. Wireless technology
    • Ad-hoc network with omni-directional antenna
    • Fixed network with directional antenna (more throughput)
  4. Network infrastructure
    • Hands-off and location management
    • Distributed or centralised db

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Routing characteristics

MANET: Mobile Ad-hoc network

WSN: Wireless sensor network

WMN: Wireless mesh network

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Routing protocols: Evaluation and metrics

  1. Criteria
    1. Routing philosophy: proactive (established), reactive (on-demand) or hybrid
    2. Network organization: flat (same role) or hierarchical (e.g. cluster)
    3. Location awareness: may or may not use localization systems embedded in the nodes
    4. Mobility: changing the point of attachment to the network
  2. Performance metrics
    • Hop count from source to destination
    • Expected transmission count
    • Expected transmission time
    • Energy consumption: challenge in MANET and WSN
    • Path availability: percentage of time a path is available

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Types of routing protocols

MANET

WSN

WMN

  1. DSDV (Highly Dynamic Destination-Sequenced Distance Vector)
  2. DSR (Dynamic Source Routing)
  3. TORA (Temporally Ordered Routing Algorithm)
  4. CGSR (Clusterhead-Gateway Switch Routing)
  5. GeoCast (Geographic Addressing and Routing)
  6. ZRP (Zone Routing Protocol)
  7. DREAM (Distance Routing Effect Algorithm for Mobility)
  8. LAR (Location-Aided Routing)
  9. OLSR (Optimized Link State Routing Protocol)
  10. AODV (Ad Hoc On Demand Distance Vector Routing)
  11. HSR (Hierarchical State Routing)
  12. FSR (Fisheye State Routing)
  13. TBRPF (Topology Broadcast Based on Reverse Path Forwarding)
  14. LANMAR (Landmark Ad Hoc Routing Protocol)
  15. GPSR (Greedy Perimeter Stateless Routing)
  1. LEACH (Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy)
  2. PEGASIS (Power-Efficient Gathering in Sensor Information Systems)
  3. TEEN (Threshold sensitive Energy Efficient Sensor Network protocol)
  4. TTDD (Two-Tier Data Dissemination Model)
  5. Random Walks
  6. Rumor Routing
  7. SPIN (Sensor Protocols for Information via Negotiation
  8. Directed Diffusion

​

  1. ​

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Routing protocols summary

​

Proactive / Reactive / Hybrid

Flat / Hierarchical

Location

aware

Metrics

Mobility

MANET

Proactive favoured

both

Yes / no

Hops, distance

Yes

WSN

Proactive / hybrid

both

Yes / no

Energy

Yes / No

WMN

Reactive / hybrid

flat

no

Tx time

Yes / No

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Designing a WMN routing protocol

  • Performance metrics
    • If low mobility use expected transmission time (low)
    • If high mobility use hop count (low)
  • Hardware technologies
    • Antenna design
    • Network connectivity
  • Routing protocol
    • Proactive for fixed wireless background
    • Hybrid seems a more sound approach to cater for traffic
  • Link or path optimization
    • Unclear

​

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WMN needs

  • Anywhere connectivity
  • Quality of service guarantees
  • Versatility
  • Ease of deployment
  • Low cost
  • Extending network coverage

Conclusion: New routing protocols specifically for WMNs are needed

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More reading up: ZigBee routing

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More reading up: Z-wave routing

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thanks!

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References

  1. Mesh vs star topology diagram from slides
  2. Understanding IoT cloud