Energy Efficient Route Selection Mechanisms for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

Resumen—In this paper we propose a new metric, the drain rate, to forecast the lifetime of nodes according to current traffic conditions. This metric is combined with the value of the remaining battery capacity to determine which nodes can be part of an active route. We describe new route selection mechanisms for MANET routing protocols, which we call the Minimum Drain Rate (MDR) and the Conditional Minimum Drain Rate (CMDR). MDR extends nodal battery life and the duration of paths, while CMDR also minimizes the total transmission energy consumed per packet. Using the ns-2 simulator and the dynamic source routing (DSR) protocol, we compare MDR and CMDR against prior proposals for energyaware routing and show that using the drain rate for energy-aware route selection offers superior performance results. Palabras clave—Mobile Ad Hoc Network, Energy-aware, Route Selection, Drain Rate.