A Distributed Algorithm for Refining Energy-Efficiency of Multicast Trees in Wireless Ad Hoc Networks

Reducing energy consumption and extending network lifetime in multicasting are two important issues in the study of wireless ad hoc networks. A number of distributed algorithms have been proposed recently that are either focused on reducing energy consumption or focused on extending network lifetime. However, there has not been a systematical study on the trade-off between these two issues. In this paper, a distributed algorithm, D-REMiT (A distributed algorithm for refining energy-efficiency of multicast trees in wireless ad hoc networks), is presented. The algorithm D-REMiT follows the general criterion focused on the metric TEC (Total Energy Consumption) while its refining is guided by the metric SL (System Lifetime) of multicast trees. This nice integration of the two metrics in the algorithm seems to well balance the two metrics of multicast trees, and improves SL of multicast trees efficiently with little sacrifice on TEC.