LEMUR: Efficient Multicasting in Ad-hoc Networks Using Label Switching and Unicast Routing

To avoid forwarding loops and the transmission of unwanted replicas of multicast data packets, current multicast routing protocols designed for ad-hoc networks require routers to use packet caches listing enough information about multicast data packets that have been forwarded. In addition, existing multicast-routing solutions for ad-hoc networks either require a multicast routing protocol that operates concurrently with a unicast routing protocol, or adding substantial signaling to the baseline unicast routing protocol. We introduce a new approach for multicasting embedded in unicast routing that eliminates the need to use packet caches for multicasting along shared multicast trees by means of label switching, and incurs minimum additional signaling overhead to attain multicast routing.