Deployment of mobile routers ensuring coverage and connectivity

Abstract: Maintaining connectivity among a group of autonomous agents exploring an area is very important, as it promotes cooperation between the agents and also helps message exchanges which are very critical for their mission. Creating an underlying Ad-hoc Mobile Router Network (AMRoNet) using simple robotic routers is an approach that facilitates communication between the agents without restricting their movements. We address the following question in our paper: How to create an AMRoNet with local information and with minimum number of routers? We propose two new localized and distributed algorithms 1) agent-assisted router deployment and 2) a self-spreading for creating AMRoNet. The algorithms use a greedy deployment strategy for deploying routers effectively into the area maximizing coverage and a triangular deployment strategy to connect different connected component of routers from different base stations. Empirical analysis shows that the proposed algorithms are the two best localized approaches to create AMRoNets.