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An Overview of Routing Protocols in Mobile Ad-

Hoc Network 1 2

DATASET · AUGUST 2015

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Md.Torikur Rahman Md.Julkar Nayeen Mahi

Jahangirnagar University Jahangirnagar University
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 Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2013 ISSN: 2277 128X
International Journal of Advanced Research in
Computer Science and Software Engineering
Research Paper
Available online at: www.ijarcsse.com
An Overview of Routing Protocols in Mobile Ad-Hoc Network
Dr.S.S.Dhenakaran1 A.Parvathavarthini2
1 2
Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science Research Assistant, Department of Women's Studies
and Engineering, Alagappa University, ,Alagappa University,Karaikudi
Karaikudi, Tamilnadu, India Tamilnadu, India

Abstract- In recent years mobile ad hoc networks have become very popular and lots of research is being done on different
aspects of MANET. Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANET)-a system of mobile nodes (laptops, sensors, etc.) interfacing
without the assistance of centralized infrastructure (access points, bridges, etc.). There are different aspects which are
taken for research like routing, synchronization, power consumption, bandwidth considerations etc. This paper
concentrates on routing techniques which is the most challenging issue due to the dynamic topology of ad hoc networks.
There are different strategies proposed for efficient routing which claimed to provide improved performance. There are
different routing protocols proposed for MANETs which makes it quite difficult to determine which protocol is suitable
for different network conditions .This paper provides an overview of different routing protocols proposed in literature and
also provides a comparison between them.

Keywords - MANETs, Routing Protocol, Performance, Dynamic Topology, Synchronization

1. INTRODUCTION

Wireless networks provide connection flexibility between users in different places. Moreover, the network can be extended to
any place or building without the need for a wired connection. Wireless networks are classified into two categories;
Infrastructure networks and Ad Hoc networks [2] as shown in Figure 1.

Wireless
Networks

Infrastructure Ad-hoc Networks

Networks
Figure1: Wireless Networks Categories
1.1. Infrastructure networks
An Access Point (AP) represents a central coordinator for all nodes. Any node can be joining the network through AP. In
addition, AP organizes the connection between the Basic Set Services (BSSs) so that the route is ready when it is needed.
However, one drawback of using an infrastructure network is the large overhead of maintaining the routing tables.
Infrastructure network as shown in Figure 2

Figure 2: Infrastructure Network.

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February - 2013, pp. 251-259
1.2. Ad Hoc networks
A wireless ad hoc network is a decentralized type of wireless network. The network is ad hoc because it does not rely on a
preexisting infrastructure, such as routers in wired networks or access points in managed (infrastructure) wireless networks
[1]. Ad Hoc networks do not have a certain topology or a central coordination point. Therefore, sending and receiving
packets are more complicated than infrastructure networks. Figure 3 illustrates an Ad Hoc network.

Figure 3: Ad Hoc network.

Nowadays, with the immense growth in wireless network applications like handheld computers, PDAs and cell phones,
researchers are encouraged to improve the network services and performance. One of the challenging design issues in
wireless Ad Hoc networks is supporting mobility in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs). The mobility of nodes in
MANETs increases the complexity of the routing protocols and the degree of connection‟s flexibility. However, the
flexibility of allowing nodes to join, leave, and transfer data to the network pose security challenges [3].

A MANET is a collection of mobile nodes sharing a wireless channel without any centralized control or established
communication backbone. MANET has dynamic topology and each mobile node has limited resources such as battery,
processing power and on-board memory[3] This kind of infrastructure-less network is very useful in situation in which
ordinary wired networks is not feasible like battlefields, natural disasters etc. The nodes which are in the transmission range
of each other communicate directly otherwise communication is done through intermediate nodes which are willing to
forward packet hence these networks are also called as multi-hop networks. MANET[2] as shown in Figure 4

Figure 4: MANET

2. CHARACTERISTICS OF MANET

Mobile ad hoc network nodes are furnished with wireless transmitters and receivers using antennas, which may be highly
directional (point-to-point), omnidirectional (broad-cast), probably steerable, or some combination. At a given point in time,
depending on positions of nodes, their transmitter and receiver coverage patterns, communication power levels and co-
channel interference levels, a wireless connectivity in the form of a random, multihop graph or "ad hoc" network exists
among the nodes. This ad hoc topology may modify with time as the nodes move or adjust their transmission and reception
parameters[6]. The characteristics of these networks are summarized as follows:

 Communication via wireless means.

 Nodes can perform the roles of both hosts and routers.
 Bandwidth-constrained, variable capacity links.

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 Energy-constrained Operation.
 Limited Physical Security.
 Dynamic network topology.
 Frequent routing updates.

3. CLASSIFICATION OF ROUTING PROTOCOLS

Routing protocols define a set of rules which governs the journey of message packets from source to destination in a network.
In MANET, there are different types of routing protocols each of them is applied according to the network circumstances.
Figure 1 shows the basic classification of the routing protocols in MANETs[1].

Fig. 1 Classification of Routing protocols

The Family Tree

3.1).Proactive Routing Protocols

Proactive routing protocols are also called as table driven routing protocols. In this every node maintain routing table which
contains information about the network topology even without requiring it[2]. This feature although useful for datagram
traffic, incurs substantial signalling traffic and power consumption [12]. The routing tables are updated periodically
whenever the network topology changes. Proactive protocols are not suitable for large networks as they need to maintain
node entries for each and every node in the routing table of every node [13]. These protocols maintain different number of
routing tables varying from protocol to protocol. There are various well known proactive routing protocols. Example: DSDV,
OLSR, WRP etc.

i) Dynamic Destination-Sequenced Distance-Vector Routing Protocol (DSDV)

DSDV[14] is developed on the basis of Bellman–Ford routing[15]algorithm with some modifications. In this routing
protocol, each mobile node in the network keeps a routing table. Each of the routing table contains the list of all available
destinations and the number of hops to each. Each table entry is tagged with a sequence number, which is originated by the
destination node. Periodic transmissions of updates of the routing tables help maintaining the topology information of the
network. If there is any new significant change for the routing information, the updates are transmitted immediately. So, the
routing information updates might either be periodic or event driven. DSDV protocol requires each mobile node in the
network to advertise its own routing table to its current neighbors. The advertisement is done either by broadcasting or by
multicasting. By the advertisements, the neighboring nodes can know about any change that has occurred in the network due
to the movements of nodes. The routing updates could be sent in two ways: one is called a „„full dump‟‟ and another is
„„incremental.‟‟ In case of full dump, the entire routing table is sent to the neighbors, where as in case of incremental update,
only the entries that require changes are sent[6].

ii) Wireless Routing Protocol (WRP)

WRP [15] belongs to the general class of path-finding algorithms [14,16,17], defined as the set of distributed shortest path
algorithms that calculate the paths using information regarding the length and second-to-last hop of the shortest path to each

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destination. WRP reduces the number of cases in which a temporary routing loop can occur. For the purpose of routing, each
node maintains four things: 1. A distance table 2. A routing table 3.A link-cost table 4. A message retransmission list (MRL).
WRP uses periodic update message transmissions to the neighbors of a node. The nodes in the response list of update
message (which is formed using MRL) should send acknowledgments. If there is no change from the last update, the nodes in
the response list should send an idle Hello message to ensure connectivity. A node can decide whether to update its routing
table after receiving an update message from a neighbor and always it looks for a better path using the new information. If a
node gets a better path, it relays back that information to the original nodes so that they can update their tables. After
receiving the acknowledgment, the original node updates its MRL. Thus, each time the consistency of the routing information
is checked by each node in this protocol, which helps to eliminate routing loops and always tries to find out the best solution
for routing in the network[6].

iii)Cluster Gateway Switch Routing Protocol (CGSR)

CGSR [18] considers a clustered mobile wireless network instead of a „„flat‟‟ network. For structuring the network into
separate but interrelated groups, cluster heads are elected using a cluster head selection algorithm. By forming several
clusters, this protocol achieves a distributed processing mechanism in the network. However, one drawback of this protocol is
that, frequent change or selection of cluster heads might be resource hungry and it might affect the routing performance.
CGSR uses DSDV protocol as the underlying routing scheme and, hence, it has the same overhead as DSDV. However, it
modifies DSDV by using a hierarchical cluster-head-to-gateway routing approach to route traffic from source to destination.
Gateway nodes are nodes that are within the communication ranges of two or more cluster heads. A packet sent by a node is
first sent to its cluster head, and then the packet is sent from the cluster head to a gateway to another cluster head, and so on
until the cluster head of the destination node is reached. The packet is then transmitted to the destination from its own cluster
head[6].

3.2). Reactive Routing Protocols

Reactive routing protocol is also known as on demand routing protocol. In this protocol route is discovered whenever it is
needed Nodes initiate route discovery on demand basis. Source node sees its route cache for the available route from source
to destination if the route is not available then it initiates route discovery process. The on- demand routing protocols have two
major components [7]:

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Route discovery: In this phase source node initiates route discovery on demand basis. Source nodes consults its route cache
for the available route from source to destination otherwise if the route is not present it initiates route discovery. The source
node, in the packet, includes the destination address of the node as well address of the intermediate nodes to the destination.

Route maintenance: Due to dynamic topology of the network cases of the route failure between the nodes arises due to link
breakage etc, so route maintenance is done. Reactive protocols have acknowledgement mechanism due to which route
maintenance is possible

Reactive protocols add latency to the network due to the route discovery mechanism. Each intermediate node involved in the
route discovery process adds latency. These protocols decrease the routing overhead but at the cost of increased latency in the
network. Hence these protocols are suitable in the situations where low routing overhead is required. There are various well
known reactive routing protocols present in MANET for example DSR, AODV, TORA and LMR [1].

i) Dynamic Source Routing (DSR)

Fig:2
Dynamic Source Routing (DSR) is a reactive protocol based on the source route approach [9]. In Dynamic Source Routing
(DSR), shown in Figure.2, the protocol is based on the link state algorithm in which source initiates route discovery on
demand basis. The sender determines the route from source to destination and it includes the address of intermediate nodes to
the route record in the packet. DSR was designed for multi hop networks for small Diameters. It is a beaconless protocol in
which no HELLO messages are exchanged between nodes to notify them of their neighbours in the network[2].

ii) Ad Hoc On-Demand Distance Vector Routing (AODV)

AODV [10] is basically an improvement of DSDV. But, AODV is a reactive routing protocol instead of proactive. It
minimizes the number of broadcasts by creating routes based on demand, which is not the case for DSDV. When any source
node wants to send a packet to a destination, it broadcasts a route request (RREQ) packet. The neighboring nodes in turn
broadcast the packet to their neighbors and the process continues until the packet reaches the destination. During the process
of forwarding the route request, intermediate nodes record the address of the neighbor from which the first copy of the
broadcast packet is received. This record is stored in their route tables, which helps for establishing a reverse path. If
additional copies of the same RREQ are later received, these packets are discarded. The reply is sent using the reverse path.
For route maintenance, when a source node moves, it can reinitiate a route discovery process. If any intermediate node moves
within a particular route, the neighbor of the drifted node can detect the link failure and sends a link failure notification to its
upstream neighbor. This process continues until the failure notification reaches the source node. Based on the received
information, the source might decide to re-initiate the route discovery phase[6].

Fig:3
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iii)Associativity-Based Routing (ABR)
ABR [11] protocol defines a new type of routing metric “degree of association stability” for mobile ad hoc networks. In this
routing protocol, a route is selected based on the degree of association stability of mobile nodes. Each node periodically
generates beacon to announce its existence. Upon receiving the beacon message, a neighbor node updates its own
associativity table. For each beacon received, the associativity tick of the receiving node with the beaconing node is
increased. A high value of associativity tick for any particular beaconing node means that the node is relatively static.
Associativity tick is reset when any neighboring node moves out of the neighborhood of any other node[6].

iv)Signal Stability–Based Adaptive Routing Protocol (SSA)

SSA [19] protocol focuses on obtaining the most stable routes through an ad hoc network. The protocol performs on demand
route discovery based on signal strength and location stability. Based on the signal strength, SSA detects weak and strong
channels in the network. SSA can be divided into two cooperative protocols: the Dynamic Routing Protocol (DRP) and the
Static Routing Protocol (SRP). DRP uses two tables: Signal Stability Table (SST) and Routing Table (RT). SST stores the
signal strengths of the neighboring nodes obtained by periodic beacons from the link layer of each neighboring node. These
signal strengths are recorded as weak or strong. DRP receives all the transmissions and, after processing, it passes those to
the SRP. SRP passes the packet to the node‟s upper layer stack if it is the destination. Otherwise, it looks for the destination
in routing table and forwards the packet. If there is no entry in the routing table for that destination, it initiates the route-
finding process. Route-request packets are forwarded to the neighbors using the strong channels. The destination, after
getting the request, chooses the first arriving request packet and sends back the reply. The DRP reverses the selected route
and sends a route-reply message back to the initiator of route request. The DRPs of the nodes along the path update their
routing tables accordingly. In case of a link failure, the intermediate nodes send an error message to the source indicating
which channel has failed. The source in turn sends an erase message to inform all nodes about the broken link and initiates a
new route-search process to find a new path to the destination[6].

v) Temporarily Ordered Routing Algorithm (TORA)

TORA [20] is a reactive routing protocol with some proactive enhancements where a link between nodes is established
creating a Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) of the route from the source node to the destination. This protocol uses a „„link
reversal‟‟ model in route discovery. A route discovery query is broadcasted and propagated throughout the network until it
reaches the destination or a node that has information about how to reach the destination. TORA defines a parameter, termed
height. Height is a measure of the distance of the responding node‟s distance upto the required destination node. In the route
discovery phase, this parameter is returned to the querying node.

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As the query response propagates back, each intermediate node updates its TORA table with the route and height to the
destination node. The source node then uses the height to select the best route toward the destination. This protocol has an
interesting property that it frequently chooses the most convenient route, rather than the shortest route. For all these attempts,
TORA tries to minimize the routing management traffic overhead[6].

3.3) Hybrid Routing Protocol

There is a trade-off between proactive and reactive protocols. Proactive protocols have large overhead and less latency while
reactive protocols have less overhead and more latency. So a Hybrid protocol is presented to overcome the shortcomings of
both proactive and reactive routing protocols. Hybrid routing protocol is combination of both proactive and reactive routing
protocol. It uses the route discovery mechanism of reactive protocol and the table maintenance mechanism of proactive
protocol so as to avoid latency and overhead problems in the network. Hybrid protocol is suitable for large networks where
large numbers of nodes are present. In this large network is divided into set of zones where routing inside the zone is
performed by using reactive approach and outside the zone routing is done using reactive approach. There are various popular
hybrid routing protocols for MANET like ZRP, SHARP [2]

i)Zone Routing Protocol (ZRP)

ZRP [21] is suitable for wide variety of MANETs, especially for the networks with large span and diverse mobility patterns.
In this protocol, each node proactively maintains routes within a local region, which is termed as routing zone. Route creation
is done using a query-reply mechanism. For creating different zones in the network, a node first has to know who its
neighbors are. A neighbor is defined as a node with whom direct communication can be established, and that is, within one
hop transmission range of a node.Neighbor discovery information is used as a basis for Intra-zone Routing Protocol (IARP),
which is described in detail in [22]. Rather than blind broadcasting, ZRP uses a query control mechanism to reduce route
query traffic by directing query messages outward from the query source and away from covered routing zones. A covered
node is a node which belongs to the routing zone of a node that has received a route query. During the forwarding of the
query packet, a node identifies whether it is coming from its neighbor or not. If yes, then it marks all of its known
neighboring nodes in its same zone as covered[2]. The query is thus relayed till it reaches the destination. The destination in
turn sends back a reply message via the reverse path and creates the route.

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ii)Sharp Hybrid Adaptive Routing Protocol (SHARP)
SHARP [23] adapts between reactive and proactive routing by dynamically varying the amount of routing information shared
proactively. This protocol defines the proactive zones around some nodes. The number of nodes in a particular proactive zone
is determined by the node-specific zone radius. All nodes within the zone radius of a particular node become the member of
that particular proactive zone for that node. If for a given destination a node is not present within a particular proactive zone,
reactive routing mechanism(query-reply)is used to establish the route to that node. Proactive routing mechanism is used
within the proactive zone. Nodes within the proactive zone maintain routes proactively only with respect to the central node.
In this protocol, proactive zones are created automatically if some destinations are frequently addressed or sought within the
network. The proactive zones act as collectors of packets, which forward the packets efficiently to the destination, once the
packets reach any node at the zone vicinity[2].

4. CONCLUSION
We have seen a great development in the field of wireless networks (infrastructure based) and in the field of Mobile ad hoc
network (infrastructure less network).In this paper a number of routing protocols for MANET, which are broadly categorized
as proactive and reactive and Hybrid protocols. The effort has been made on the comparative study of Reactive, Proactive
and Hybrid routing protocols has been presented in the form of table. There are various shortcomings in different routing
protocols and it is difficult to choose routing protocol for different situations as there is tradeoff between various protocols.
There are various challenges that need to be met, so these networks are going to have widespread use in the future.

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