An out-band control mechanism for Ad hoc networks routings

Energy conserving performance is an important criterion in routing protocol design in Ad hoc networks. In this paper, we propose a radio on-off control mechanism which requires an additional radio on each node to transmit control packets using a control channel for conserving energy. This mechanism allows idle nodes to turn off their data communication radios based routing information. The proposed method prevents nodes from wasting energy on idling and overhearing unintended data traffic. We apply the proposed mechanism to AODV routing protocol and compare it with original AODV and EA-AODV—a single channel energy conserving extension to AODV. Simulation results show that the proposed mechanism outperforms AODV and EA-AODV in conserving energy in static ad hoc networks.