Determining Density in Ad hoc Networks

Nodes in an ad hoc network are potentially in motion, meaning that the density of an ad hoc network can vary over time. Increasing density can result in congestion and collisions, while decreasing it may lead to poor coverage. For these reasons, density is considered an important metric for defining network environments. The density of an ad hoc network is referred to when performance metrics are defined, when routing parameters are tuned, and when different kinds of protocols are compared. Despite the importance of density, little research appears to have been done to determine it in ad hoc networks. In this paper, two algorithms for determining density are proposed: a census of nodes and traffic analysis. To validate these algorithms, the simulation results are also presented