Improved estimation procedure for counting neighbors in underwater networks

In ad-hoc networks, at the beginning of network formation or later for routing purposes it is essential for a node to know how many neighbors it has. The capture effect, the effect of receiving a packet from a collision, can degrade the performance of the procedure of estimation of number of neighbors (ENN). The capture effect depends on different network parameters which are different in underwater communication networks (UCNs) than terrestrial communication networks (TCNs). Both electromagnetic (EM) and acoustic waves can be used in UCNs. Furthermore, underwater acoustic networks (UANs) have the problem of long propagation delays. These issues make the ENN procedure complicated. Here we propose an improved ENN procedure for UCNs as well as for TCNs which is not affected by the capture effect. The procedure requires fewer slots than earlier approaches and is much effective with packet reception time variations.