An Efficient Clustering Algorithm for Topology Maintenance and Energy Saving in MANETs

Mobile Ad Hoc NETworks (MANETs) consist of wireless mobile nodes, each of which can act as a router to relay data for others without a pre-existing infrastructure. In MANETs, both topology maintenance and energy efficiency are important, but have usually been addressed separately. This paper proposes a new dynamic clustering algorithm to address both energy conservation and topology maintenance simultaneously. Energy is saved by optimizing the organization of the cluster and by reducing the flooding in backbone route discovery. Topology maintenance is achieved effectively by dynamically changing the structure of the network using an adaptive beacon message according to the mobility rate of the nodes.