Improving Broadcasting Performance by Clustering with Stability for Inter-Vehicle Communication

In this paper we propose a novel broadcasting scheme for vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs) in the service of intelligent transportation systems (ITS). Designing efficient broadcasting algorithms is critical as a fundamental service in supporting many other applications and protocols. Various broadcasting protocols have been proposed for mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) in order to reduce the redundant retransmissions known as the "broadcast storm problem". By takings advantage of the unique features of vehicular networks, our cluster-based scheme provides an efficient and stable hierarchical network backbone, and in addition cluster heads and some selected gateway nodes are responsible for rebroadcasting. A simulation study has been conducted in an innovative and realistic vehicular network. The results show our scheme significantly reducing the number of retransmissions, while improving the reachability in comparison to other schemes.