Link Quality-based Routing Protocol for Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Routing is one of the fundamental tasks in any Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks (UASNs). There are many UASNs routing protocols, which are designed based on different factors. The link quality is one of the significant factors that influence the performance of routing in underwater communication. The major contribution of the paper is proposing and designing a Link Quality-based Routing Protocol (LQRP). The LQRP avoids beacons to measure the link quality or history of successful transmissions; instead, it uses physical characteristics of underwater such as temperature, salinity, pH, shipping activity, and wind speed. Further, LQRP compared with Link Quality Estimation based Routing protocol (LQER), through MATLAB simulations.