Routing using partition-wide information in wireless Delay Tolerant Networks

We present the Extended Minimum Estimated Expected Delay (EMEED) protocol. EMEED is designed for use in wireless Delay Tolerant Networks (DTNs) that consist of a large number of highly mobile nodes with non-uniform mobility patterns. Under the EMEED protocol, any two nodes that are often in contact, either directly or through a multihop path, disseminate in the network the expected time they have to wait until they come into contact. Nodes route packets according to routing tables created using these expected times. When its main parameter, the contact radius, is equal to unity, the EMEED protocol operates similarly to the well known MEED protocol. However, using simulations, we show that for many mobility scenarios, when the contact radius is greater than unity, the EMEED protocol performs far better than MEED, in terms of throughput and delay, with only a modest increase in the control overhead.