The performance of query control schemes for the zone routing protocol

Abstract

We study the performance of route query control mechanisms for the zone routing protocol (ZRP) for ad hoc networks. The ZRP proactively maintains routing information for a local neighborhood (routing zone), while reactively acquiring routes to destinations beyond the routing zone. This hybrid routing approach can be more efficient than traditional routing schemes. However, without proper query control techniques, the ZRP cannot provide the expected reduction in the control traffic. Our proposed query control schemes exploit the structure of the routing zone to provide enhanced detection and prevention of overlapping queries. These techniques can be applied to single- or multiple-channel ad hoc networks to improve both the delay and control traffic performance of ZRP. Our query control mechanisms allow ZRP to provide routes to all accessible network nodes, with less control traffic than purely proactive link state or purely reactive route discovery, and with less delay than conventional flood searching.