Page 2 Lecture Notes in Computer Science 2865 Edited by G. Goos ...

Extending Seamless IP Multicast Edge-Coveragethrough Mobile Ad Hoc Access NetworksPedro M. Ruiz 1 , Antonio F. Gomez-Skarmeta 1 ,Pedro Martinez 1 , and David Larrabeiti 21 University of Murcia, Facultad de Informatica, Dept. of Information andCommunication Engineering, Campus de Espinardo,E-30100 Espinardo (Murcia), Spain{pedrom,skarmeta,pma}@dif.um.es2 University Carlos III of Madrid, Dept. of Telematic Engineering,Campus de Leganes, Avda. Universidad, 30,E-28911 Leganes (Madrid), Spaindlarra@it.uc3m.esAbstract. The provision of multicast communications in wireless andwired networks has followed different paths which have led to differentsolutions. Little has been accomplished to-date in bringing together thetraditional IP multicast model used in fixed networks and multicast routingprotocols for wireless ad hoc networks. We analyse the provision ofan integrated IP multicast service in which mobile hosts can seamlesslyparticipate in IP multicast sessions regardless of the currently underlyingnetwork type. We propose a multicast architecture in combinationwith a new ad hoc multicast routing protocol called MMARP. MMARPnodes are challenged with special IGMP-handling capabilities allowingour solution to combine the efficiency of multicast ad hoc routing protocolswith the support of standard-IP nodes without an impairment inthe performance of the protocol. Our empirical results demonstrate thatsuch kind of multicast ad hoc access networks offer a good performancewhen compared with the traditional single-hop wireless multicast access.1 IntroductionIP Multicast is suited for efficient multipoint communications among a groupof nodes. It has emerged as one of the most researched areas in networking.The problem of efficient packet distribution to a specific group of destinationshas been researched since the late 80’s and most of the routers nowadays supportIP multicast routing protocols. The main benefit of IP Multicast is thatthe bandwidth consumption for group communications is dramatically reducedcompared to unicast-based group communications. This is of particular interestfor ‘all-IP’ and ‘beyond 3G’ mobile networks consisting of a high number ofuser terminals using applications which are typically interactive, multiparty andbandwidth-avid.Many projects like the IST project MIND (Mobile IP-based Network Developments)[1] have researched the extension of IP-based radio access networks toS. Pierre, M. Barbeau, and E. Kranakis (Eds.): ADHOC-NOW 2003, LNCS 2865, pp. 84–95, 2003.c○ Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2003