Multipath Activity Based Routing Protocol for Mobile ‎Cognitive Radio Ad Hoc Networks

Cognitive radio networks improve spectrum utilization by ‎sharing licensed spectrum with cognitive radio devices. In ‎cognitive radio ad hoc networks the routing protocol is one ‎of the most challenging tasks due to the changes in ‎frequency spectrum and the interrupted connectivity ‎caused by the primary user activity. In this paper, a multi‎path activity based routing protocol for cognitive radio ‎network (MACNRP) is proposed. The protocol utilizes ‎channel availability and creates multiple node-disjoint ‎routes between the source and destination nodes. The ‎proposed protocol is compared with D2CARP and FTCRP ‎protocols. The performance evaluation is conducted ‎through mathematical analysis and using OPNET ‎simulation. The performance of the proposed protocol ‎achieves an increase in network throughput; besides it ‎decreases the probability of route failure due to node ‎mobility and primary user activity. We have found that the ‎MACNRP scheme results in 50% to 75% reduction in ‎blocking probability and 33% to 78% improvement in ‎network throughput, with a reasonable additional routing ‎overhead and average packet delay. Due to the successful ‎reduction of collision between primary users and ‎cognitive users, the MACNRP scheme results in decreasing ‎the path failure rate by 50% to 87%.‎