A cluster-oriented mutual exclusion algorithm for mobile ad hoc network

Abstract

Mobile Ad hoc Networks (MANET) are gaining importance in recent years due to its easy deployability, cost effectiveness in terms of time and infrastructure requirement and special-purpose applications. These Networks are mainly meant for collaborative and distributed applications that require resource sharing among the network nodes. Thus distributed mutual exclusion is also important in MANET environment. In this paper an attempt has been made to propose a new cluster oriented mutual exclusion algorithm based not on tokens but on permissions. The proposed algorithm always views the ad hoc network as a dynamic graph comprising of a set of star graphs known as clusters. The respective cluster leaders are determined so that all the cluster leaders form a connected tree structure. The well-studied spanning tree and depth first search algorithms of graph theory are used to find the subgraphs/clusters and leaders.