An interest-driven approach to integrated unicast and multicast routing in MANETs

Abstract

This paper introduces an integrated framework for multicast and unicast routing in mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) based on interest-defined mesh enclaves. Such meshes are connected components of a MANET that span the sources and receivers of unicast and multicast flows. We present the Protocol for Routing in Interest-defined Mesh Enclaves (PRIME), which establishes meshes that are activated and deactivated by the presence or absence of interest in destinations and groups, and which confines most of the signaling overhead within regions of interest (enclaves) in such meshes. Experimental results based on simulations show that PRIME attains similar or better data delivery and end-to-end delays than traditional unicast and multicast routing schemes for MANETs (AODV, OLSR, ODMRP), and that PRIME incurs only a fraction of the signaling overhead of traditional routing schemes.