Selecting the Best Mobility Model with the AODV Routing Protocol in MANETs

A mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is an autonomous, self-configuring network of mobile nodes that can be formed without the need of any pre-established infrastructure or centralized administration. MANETs are extremely flexible and each node is free to move independently, in any random direction. Each node in the MANET maintains continuously the information required to properly route traffic. This paper presents a simulation study to analyze and evaluate the behavior of the MANET with AODV routing protocol by testing four mobility models (i.e. Waypoint(RWP), Reference Point Group Model (RPGM), Gauss Markov Model (GMM) and Manhattan Grid Model (MGM)).

Several performance metrics (Throughput, Packet Delivery Fraction (PDF), Average End-to-end Delay (AED),Normalize Routing Load (NRL) and packets loss) were suggested as a measuring tool to be used in the comparison stage for all these four mobility models using NS- 2.Various parameters such as different number of nodes, different speeds, different pause times, different environment areas and different traffic rates were also used in five suggested scenarios. The results indicated that the best performance of AODV routing protocol is with RPGM mobility model than other mobility models.