Hybrid Wireless Networks - Towards an Efficient Gateway Discovery Scheme

An ever-growing demand for higher data-rates and coverage extension has motivated the interconnection of mobile ad-hoc networks to fixed IP networks, to form a Hybrid Wireless Network (HWN). The convergence of ad-hoc and infrastructure network is also attractive in real-world scenarios due to its practicality and usefulness. In HWNs, gateways are generally used as an interconnection point for the integrated network. In order to improve the overall performance of the HWN, an efficient gateway discovery and selection scheme is indispensable. In this paper, we expose some motivations behind the HWNs keeping an eye on the practical perspectives. The current state of the art for gateway discovery in Hybrid Wireless Networks is presented. The previously proposed solutions based on adaptive hybrid gateway discovery schemes are analyzed, and useful research directions have been given in order to improve the performance of gateway discovery in HWNs. A novel Adaptive Distributed gateway Discovery (ADD) scheme for HWNs is also proposed.