Performance Analysis of MANET Routing Protocols for UAV Communications

Abstract

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs or commonly known as drones) have the potential benefits in improving communications in wireless network environment. Besides their utilization in military operations, the potential use and applicability of UAVs in civilian applications is becoming a fast growing phenomenon. Routing is one of the vital aspects while conducting wireless communication among UAVs. It is extremely challenging because of dynamic topology changes resulted from frequent mobility of UAVs. In this paper, we analyse the performance of different Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET) routing protocols for the communication of UAVs. Using Riverbed (OPNET) Modeler, we evaluate the performance of four MANET routing protocols (AODV, DSR, GRP and OLSR) for UAV communications based on scenarios of various data rates supported by IEEE 802.11p (WAVE) standard.