A scheme for efficient topology management of wireless ad hoc networks using the MARI algorithm

Wireless ad hoc networks consist of nodes which can communicate with each other in a peer-to-peer fashion over single hop or multi hops without any fixed infrastructure such as access point or base station. In flat topology there is no topology management concept and all the nodes participate in routing. In this paper the task of topology management for ad hoc networks is implemented using Routing Intelligence Mobile Agent (MARI) Algorithm and the performance is compared with that of flat topology network having same number nodes. In the proposed scheme the nodes with higher power levels among their one hop neighbors are selected as MARI nodes and these participate in routing. To provide communication between any two MARI nodes a midway node is selected. Only these MARI and midway nodes will stay awake and the remaining nodes will be in sleep mode so that there is power saving. In this paper, the power consumption and back off delay performance of a flat network and a network employing MARI algorithm are compared. The proposed MARI topology management is found to have less power consumption and less back-off delay as compared with flat topology.