RSU deployment scheme with power control for highway message propagation in VANETs

Nowadays, message propagation has been one of the major tasks of Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks (VANETs). The main obstacle of message propagation, which relies on the data forwarding among vehicles, is the frequent change in network topology, as the intermittent link between the vehicles will degrade the performance of message propagation. Hence, RSUs are deployed to extend vehicle coverage and improve network performance in VANETs. However, non-optimal RSU deployment may result in greater power consumption and lower quality of network performance. In this paper, we study the vehicle mobility characteristics along the highway and propose a Cluster-based RSU Deployment (CRD) scheme with the Traffic-Aware Power Control (TAPC) method to maximize the network performance, as well as minimizing the energy consumption of RSUs. Moreover, we develop a data propagation algorithm, Data-Driven Message Propagation (DDMP), to improve the performance of message propagation in RSU-assisted VANETs. The performance of the proposed scheme is analytically evaluated by comparing performance in with and without our scheme scenarios. Through extensive simulations, with the aid of our scheme, the performance of message propagation is improved significantly, in terms of the propagation latency and the power consumption.