Gateway Selection in Multi-Hop Wireless Networks Using Route and Link Optimization

In recent years, along with the increasing popularity of multi-hop wireless networks, there has been a growing demand in the coupling of these networks to external ones such as the Internet. As traffic destined for external networks increases, special attention is required not only in gateway selection, but also in optimized routing and scheduling in order to maximize the network performance. In this paper we introduce the Ideally Scheduled Route Optimization (ISRO) method to address this concern. ISRO is the combination of three separate optimization problems: optimal routing of gateway traffic under ideal conditions, interference-free scheduling to determine link capacity, and route adjustment in light of the new link capacities. The performance of ISRO is evaluated by experiment which shows significant potential in maximizing the throughput and capacity of the network.