Node relocation algorithms for improving communications quality in ad hoc networks

Abstract

We present node relocation algorithms to achieve better communications quality in a mobile wireless ad hoc network. Our aim is to manage the ad hoc network autonomously. The communications quality is improved by decreasing distance from the source to the destination node in the network. A problem is defined as how to relocate relay nodes in the network to minimize distance in the network and moreover to minimize the distance of moving the nodes. The shorter moving distance of a node leads to the less battery consumption by the moving. We propose two algorithms, i.e., one that was centralized and a decentralized one. The former is based on the minimum spanning tree algorithm. Since the latter is not solved efficiently, we present an approximation algorithm using the distributed election algorithm.