Ad Hoc Networks: Overview

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Textbook
C. Siva Ram Murthy and B. S. Manoj, Ad Hoc Wireless
Networks: Architectures and Protocols, Prentice Hall
PTR, 2004.
References
Carlos de Morais Cordeiro and Dharma Prakash
Agrawal, Ad Hoc & Sensor Networks: Theory and
Applications, World Scientific Publishing Co., 2006.
Feng Zhao and Leonidas Guibas, Wireless Sensor
Networks: An Information Processing Approach,
Elsevier, 2004.
Edgar H. Callaway, Jr., Wireless Sensor Netwoks:
Architectures and Protocols, Auerbach, 2004.

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Related Sites
Advanced Network Technologies Division, NIST,
Wireless Ad Hoc Networks,
http://w3.antd.nist.gov/wahn_home.shtml
Autonomous Networks Research Group, USC
WSN bibliography, http://ceng.usc.edu/~anrg/SensorNetBib.html
IETF MANET WG
http://www.ietf.org/html.charters/manet-charter.html
IEEE 802 WG
http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/802/dots.html
Zigbee
http://www.zigbee.org
TinyOS
http://www.tinyos.net/

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Wireless Network Technology

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Wireless Networks
Wireless Networks
Infrastructured Network
Cellular Network (3GPP or 3GPP2)
Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11)
Infrastructureless Network Internet
Ad Hoc Network
WLAN

Cellular

[Mobile/Wireless] Ad Hoc Networks

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Ad Hoc Networks vs.
Ad hoc networks vs. Wireless mobile networks
Infrastructureless vs. Infrastructured Network
All devices of an ad hoc network are likely to have similar
constraints
Ad hoc networks vs. Peer-to-peer networks
P2P devices use existing networked structures such as
Internet
All P2P networks are not ad hoc network
Because NOT all ad hoc network utilize an existing structure for
the communication among devices
Ad hoc computing vs. Pervasive computing
The devices for pervasive computing are usually very small
and can be embedded in any type of objects
Users are sometimes not even aware of the existence of the
embedded electronic chips

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Ad hoc networks (1)
Temporary network composed of mobile nodes
without preexisting communication infrastructure,
such as Access Point (AP) and Base Station (BS).
Each node plays the role of router for multi-hop routing.
Self-organizing network without infrastructure
networks
Started from DARPA PRNet in 1970
Cooperative nodes (wireless)
Each node decode-and-forward packets for other nodes
Multi-hop packet forwarding through wireless
links
Proactive/reactive/hybrid routing protocols
Most works based on CSMA/CA to solve the
interference problem
IEEE 802.11 MAC

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Ad hoc networks (2)
But, there is no links
Nodes simply radiate energy
Nodes can be cooperative in many other ways (complex)
Amplify and forward
interference cancellation to increase SINR
There may be many things out there that we can take
advantage of across layers for improvement!

A F
C D
B
E

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Ad Hoc Network (3)

Ad hoc networks

Mobile ad hoc networks

(MANETs) Wireless
Wirelss Mesh Networks sensor networks
(WMN)

The application areas, the security requirements and the

constraints of the single devices differ

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Cellular Net vs. Ad Hoc Net (1)
Cellular Net Ad Hoc Net

Fixed infrastructure-based Infrastruxture-less

1-hop wireless links Multi-hop wireless links

Guaranteed bandwidth Shared radio channel

Centralized routing Distributed routing

Seamless connectivity
High cost and time of deployment
Frequency reuse through
geographical channel reuse
Time sync: easier to achieve.
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Frequent path breaks due to
mobility
Quick and cost-effective
deployment
Dynamic frequency reuse based
on CSMA
Difficult and consume BW
Cellular Net vs. Ad Hoc Net (2)
Cellular Net
BW reservation: easier
App. Domain: civilian and
commercial sector
High cost of net maintenance
MHs: low complexity
Major goal of routing: max call
acceptance, min call drop
Widely deployed
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Ad Hoc Net
Requires complex MAC
Battlefields, emergency operations,
collaborative computing
Self-organization and maintenance
is built into net
More intelligence
Find paths with min overhead,
quick reconfiguration of broken
paths
Several issues are to be addressed
for commercial deployment,
Widespread use in defense
Major Applications Demands for
group
communications
Military
Emergency Service
Collaborative and Distributed Computing
Wireless Mesh Network
Wireless Sensor Network
Telematics
Wireless Personal Area Network
Home Network
Ad Hoc Relay for Cellular Network
Networks for ubiquitous computing
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Military

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Emergency Service

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MANET Research Target
MANET
No infrastructure
Self organizing networks
Communications via mobile
nodes
Dynamic topology
Heterogeneity bandwidth-
constrained variable-
capacity links
Limited physical security
Nodes with limited battery
life and storage capabilities
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Issues in MANET
Ad Hoc Unicast Routing
Ad Hoc Multicast/Broadcast
Routing
Power Saving
Global Connectivity for
MANET
Addressing & DNS Service
Automatic Support of
Networking in MANET
MANET Autoconfiguration
Wireless Mesh Networks
Mesh network implemented over WLAN
Industrial standards Activities
IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.15, IEEE 801.16 have
established sub-working groups to focus on new
standards for WMNs

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WMN Architecture
WMNs (Wireless Mesh Networks) consist of:
mesh routers and mesh clients
Mesh routers
Conventional wireless AP (Access Point) functions
Additional mesh routing functions to support multi-hop
communications
Usually multiple wireless interfaces built on either the same or
different radio technologies
Mesh clients
Can also work as a router for client WMN
Usually one wireless interface
Classification of WMN architecture
Infrastructure/Backbone WMNs
Client WMNs
Hybrid WMNs
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Infrastructure/backbone WMNs

Internet

Wireless Mesh
Backbone

Wired Clients
Mesh Router Mesh Router Mesh Router
with Gateway with Gateway

Mesh Router
Mesh Router
with Gateway/Bridge
with Gateway/Bridge
Wireless Clients
Mesh Router Mesh Router
with Gateway/Bridge with Gateway/Bridge

Sink node
Access Point Sensor

Wi-Fi Sensor
Networks Base Station Networks
Base Station
Cellular
Networks WiMAX
Networks

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Client WMNs

Mesh Client

Mesh Client

Mesh Client

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Hybrid WMNs

Internet

Wireless Mesh
Backbone

Mesh Router Mesh Router Mesh Router

with Gateway with Gateway

Mesh Router
Mesh Router
with Gateway/Bridge
with Gateway/Bridge

Mesh Router Mesh Router Mesh Router

Wi-Fi, Wi-MAX,
Sensor Networks, Conventional Clients
Cellular Networks, etc.

Wireless Mesh Clients

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Sensor Network Model

Sink

Stimulus Source Sink

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Wireless Sensor Networks
A sort of ad-hoc networks Ad Hoc Net
A network of low cost,
densely deployed, Wireless
untethered sensor nodes
Application areas:
Sensor
heath, military, and home Network
Placed in inaccessible terrains or disaster areas
It may be impossible to recharge batteries
Different Node Characteristics from Traditional nodes
# of nodes in a sensor network can be several orders of magnitude
higher than the nodes in an Ad Hoc network (100s to 1000s nodes)
Densely deployed (20 nodes/m3)
Prone to failures
Topology changes very frequently
Mainly use a broadcast communication, whereas most Ad Hoc
networks are based on point-to-point
Limited in power, computing capacities, and memory
May not have global ID because of the large amount of overhead and
large number of sensors

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Existing Wireless Net vs. Sensor Net
Cellular system Bluetooth, MANET Sensor Network

Single Hop Multi-hop Multi-hop

High QOS High QOS Power conservation

Bandwidth
efficiency
Limited bandwidth
Large number of
node
Narrow radio range

Frequent topology
change
Station to Base Peer to peer Peer to multi node
station Peer to multi node
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Sensor Networks Architecture
Sensor node
Made up of four basic components
Sensing unit, Processing unit, Transceiver unit, and Power
unit
Additional application-dependent components
Location finding system, power generator, and mobilizer
Scattered in a sensor field
Collect data and route data back to the sink
Sink
Communicate with the task manager node (user) via
Internet or satellite

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Challenges in Ad Hoc Networks
Limited wireless transmission range
Broadcast nature of the wireless medium
Packet losses due to transmission errors
Mobility-induced route changes
Mobility-induced packet losses
Battery constraints
Potentially frequent network partitions
Ease of snooping on wireless
transmissions (security hazard)

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Issues in Ad Hoc Networks
Medium access scheme
Routing
Multicasting
Transport layer protocol
Pricing shceme
QoS provisioning
Security
Energy management
Addressing and service discovery
Scalability
Deployment considerations
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Medium Access Scheme
Distributed operation
Synchronization
Hidden terminal problem
Exposed terminal problem
Throughput
Access delay
Fairness: especially for relaying nodes
Real-time traffic support
Resource reservation
Ability to measure resource availability
Capability for power control
Adaptive rate control
Use of directional antennas

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Routing (1)
Challenges
Mobility
results in path breaks, packet collisions, transient loops, stale
routing information, and difficulty in resource reservation
BW constraints
Error-prone and shred channel
BER: 10-5 ~ 10-3 wireless vs. 10-12 ~ 10-9 wired
Location-dependent contention
Distribute load uniformly

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Routing (2)
Requirements
Minimum route acquisition delay
Quick route reconfiguration
Loop-free routing
Distributed routing approach
Minimum control overhead
Scalability
QoS provisioning
Support for time-sensitive traffic
Security and privacy

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Multicasting
Robusteness
recover and reconfigure quickly from potential
mobility-induced link breaks
Efficiency
Min control overhead
QoS support
Efficient group management
Scalability
security

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Transport Layer Protocols
UDP
No congestion control congestion increase contention
degrade throughput
TCP: major performance degradation due to
Frequent path break
route reconfiguration RTO ReTx/CC low throughput
Stale routing information
Increase out-of-order packets dup ACKs CC
High channel error rate
Loss of data/ACK ACK is delayed RTO CC
Frequent network partition
All the packets dropped RTO/multiple ReTx increase RTO/CC

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Security
DoS attack
Resource consumption
Energy depletion
Buffer overflow
Host impersonation
Information disclosure
Interference

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Energy Management
Tx power mgmt
MAC: sleep mode
Routing: consider battery life time: load balancing
Transport: reduce ReTx
App
Battery energy mgmt
Extend battery life by taking adv of chemical
properties, discharge patterns, and by the selection of
a battery from a set of batteries
Processor power mgmt
Device power mgmt
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Deployment Consideration (1)
Adv. in ad hoc net
Low cont of deployment
Incremental deplyment
Short deplyment time
Reconfigurablity
Scenario of deployment
Military deployment: data-centric or user-centric
Emergency operation deployment: hend-held,
voice/data, < 100 nodes
Commercial wide-area deployment: e.g. WMN
Home network deplyment

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Deployment Consideration (2)
Required longevity of network
Area of coverage
Service availability: redundancy
Operational integration with other infrastructure
Satellite network, UAV(unmanned aerial vehicles), GPS
Cellular network
Choice of protocols
TDMA or CSMA-based MAC?
Geographical routing (using GPS)
Power-saving routing ?
TCP extension ?

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