Enhanced-Ant-AODV for optimal route selection in mobile ad-hoc network

Selection of an optimal path is a challenging issue in Mobile Ad-hoc network (MANET). This paper proposes a new mechanism for route selection combining Ad-hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) protocol with Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) to improve Quality of Service (QoS) in MANET. Based on the mechanism of ant colony with AODV, the finest route for data delivery is selected using pheromone value of the path. In the proposed work, pheromone value of a route is calculated based on end to end reliability of the path, congestion, number of hops and residual energy of the nodes along the path. The path which has highest pheromone value will be selected for transmission of the data packet. The simulation result shows that the proposed scheme outperforms AODV, Dynamic Source Routing (DSR) and Enhanced-Ant-DSR routing algorithms.