A Self-Optimizing Routing Algorithm in a 3-Dimensional Virtual Grid Network

In this paper, we present a self-optimizing routing algorithm using local information only, in a three-dimensional (3D) virtual grid network. A virtual grid network is a well-known network model for its ease of designing algorithms and saving energy consumption. We consider a 3D virtual grid network which is obtained by virtually dividing a network into a set of unit cubes called cells. There is one specific node named a router at each cell, and each router is connected with the routers at adjacent cells. This implies that each router can communicate with 6 routers. We suppose one special node (named a source node) and one moving node (named a destination node) in a 3D virtual grid networks. We consider maintenance of an inter-cell communication path to a destination node from a source node. We propose an optimizing protocol in a 3D virtual grid network, which can transform an arbitrary given path (from a source node to a destination node) to the optimal (shortest) path using only local information (6 hops: 3 hops each back and forward along the routing path) of each router.