A spectrum aware routing protocol for ad-hoc cognitive radio networks

The paper proposes a routing protocol that efficiently coordinates data flows among secondary systems with heterogeneous spectrum availability in an ad-hoc cognitive radio network architecture. Efficient protocol operation as a matter of maximum-possible routing paths establishments and minimum delays is obtained by a coordination mechanism, which was implemented based on a simulation scenario. The simulation scenario includes a number of secondary systems that exploit television white spaces, under the spectrum of commons regime. The validity of the research approach is verified via a number of experimental tests, conducted under controlled simulation conditions, evaluating the performance of the proposed routing protocol.