Load-balancing in MANET shortest-path routing protocols

Mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) are infrastructure-less networks, dynamically formed by an independent system of mobile nodes that are connected via wireless links. Because routing is performed by nodes with limited resources, load should be efficiently distributed through the network. Otherwise, heavily-loaded nodes may make up a bottleneck that lowers the network performances by congestion and larger delays. Regrettably, load-balancing is a critical deficiency in MANET shortest-path routing protocols, as nodes at the center of the network are much heavily-loaded than the others. Thus, we propose, in this paper, load-balancing mechanisms that push the traffic further from the center of the network. Basically, we provide novel routing metrics that take into account nodes degree of centrality, for both proactive and reactive routing protocols. Simulations show that the proposed mechanisms improve the load distribution and significantly enhance the network performances in terms of average delay and reliability.