Delay and capacity in ad hoc mobile networks with f-cast relay algorithms

The two-hop relay algorithm and its variants have been attractive for ad hoc mobile networks, because they are simple yet efficient, and more importantly, they enable the capacity and delay to be studied analytically. This paper considers a general two-hop relay with f-cast (2HR-f), where each packet is delivered to at most f distinct relay nodes and should be received in order at its destination. We derive the closed-form theoretical models rather than order sense ones for the 2HR-f algorithm with a careful consideration of the important interference, medium contention, traffic contention and queuing delay issues, which enable an accurate delay and capacity analysis to be performed for an ad hoc mobile network employing the 2HR-f. Based on our models, one can directly get the corresponding order sense results. Extensive simulation studies are also conducted to demonstrate the efficiency of these new models.