A Multi-Aware Cluster Head Maintenance for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

In Mobile Ad Hoc Network (MANET), resources are limited and valuable. Battery power is a sensitive resource, it is limited due to the relatively small size of the mobile nodes. Managing this limited resource with the current battery manufacturing techniques is a key challenge in MANET environment. In order to achieve scalability in MANET, hierarchical solutions are adopted like the cluster-based concept. In such techniques, electing the cluster heads and maintaining them throughout the progress of the network lifetime are vital and critical functions. This paper proposes a multi-aware approach namely, Multi-Aware Cluster Head Maintenance (MACHM) to elect the cluster heads based on a weighted formula. The weighted formula includes load balancing, geographical, mobility, and energy considerations. Also, a mechanism to handle the elected cluster heads depending on their energy levels has been proposed. Simulation results show that MACHM outperforms the Weighted Clustering Algorithm (WCA) regarding different performance metrics. Keywords-MANET routing protocols; power-aware routing protocols; cluster-based routing protocols; multi-aware cluster head maintenance; cluster heads election and re-election;