Probabilistic protocols for node discovery in ad-hoc, single broadcast channel networks

The initial state in an ad-hoc network is a collection of nodes that are unaware of each other's presence. The very first step in joining and building the ad-hoc network is, thus, to discover other nodes. This node discovery procedure is a key step in configuring and optimizing the topology of the network. In spite of its relevance, node discovery has not yet been studied in detail and existing protocols are strongly tied to concrete network implementations. In this paper, we propose a model for node discovery that facilitates the analytical treatment of the problem. We concentrate on networks with a single shared broadcast channel. For these networks, we propose a number of protocols that shed light on the problem of node discovery.