Open Access

ARTICLE

A Dynamic Resource-Aware Routing Protocol in Resource-Constrained Opportunistic Networks

by Aref Hassan Kurd Ali^1,*, Halikul Lenando¹, Slim Chaoui^2,3, Mohamad Alrfaay^1,4, Medhat A. Tawfeek^5,6

1 Department of Computer Systems and Communication Technologies, Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Kota Samarahan, 94300, Malaysia
2 Department of Computer Engineering and Networks, College of Computer and Information Sciences, Jouf University, Sakaka, 2014, KSA
3 Unit-Lab of Sciences of Electronics, Technologies of Information and Telecommunications, Sfax University, Sfax, Tunisia
4 Department of Basic Sciences, First Common Year Deanship, Jouf University, Sakaka, 2014, KSA
5 Department of Computer Sciences, College of Computer and Information Sciences, Jouf University, Sakaka, 2014, KSA
6 Department of Computer Sciences, Faculty of Computers and Information, Menoufia University, Egypt

* Corresponding Author: Aref Hassan Kurd Ali. Email:

Computers, Materials & Continua 2022, 70(2), 4147-4167. https://doi.org/10.32604/cmc.2022.020659

Received 02 June 2021; Accepted 20 July 2021; Issue published 27 September 2021

Abstract

Recently, Opportunistic Networks (OppNets) are considered to be one of the most attractive developments of Mobile Ad Hoc Networks that have arisen thanks to the development of intelligent devices. OppNets are characterized by a rough and dynamic topology as well as unpredictable contacts and contact times. Data is forwarded and stored in intermediate nodes until the next opportunity occurs. Therefore, achieving a high delivery ratio in OppNets is a challenging issue. It is imperative that any routing protocol use network resources, as far as they are available, in order to achieve higher network performance. In this article, we introduce the Resource-Aware Routing (ReAR) protocol which dynamically controls the buffer usage with the aim of balancing the load in resource-constrained, stateless and non-social OppNets. The ReAR protocol invokes our recently introduced mutual information-based weighting approach to estimate the impact of the buffer size on the network performance and ultimately to regulate the buffer consumption in real time. The proposed routing protocol is proofed conceptually and simulated using the Opportunistic Network Environment simulator. Experiments show that the ReAR protocol outperforms a set of well-known routing protocols such as EBR, Epidemic MaxProp, energy-aware Spray and Wait and energy-aware PRoPHET in terms of message delivery ratio and overhead ratio.

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Keywords

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