ACO based Clustering Protocol for Resource Constrained Mobile Adhoc Networks

Ad-hoc networks (MANETs) are increasingly popular with recent advancements in computer and communications technologies. A mobility-based clustering (MBC) protocol for wireless ad hoc network with mobile nodes works well in an energy constrained network environment, where a node elects itself as a cluster-head based on its residual energy and mobility. A non-cluster-head node aims at its link stability with a cluster head during its association in the estimated connection time. In a centralized network, data packets from source need to travel to the destination with minimum number of hops, which commendably reduces the energy requirement. Still there exist chances for congestion occurrence in course of the transmission if all the source nodes select the same sequence of hops for their transmission. In the distributed network scenario, each non-cluster-head node is allocated a timeslot for data transmission to the destination. Analyzing the performance of such centralized and distributed network shows the dependency of source node on other nodes for transmission, high delay and low packet delivery ratio. We propose a new routing mechanism based on ant colony algorithm to average the energy consumption of main nodes and reduce the transmission time so as to give a balance of energy consumption between nodes. Thus Ant colony algorithm with centralized and distributed network can give better performance characteristics.