title: DTN routing in body sensor networks with dynamic postural partitioning.
abstract: This paper presents novel store-and-forward packet routing algorithms for Wireless Body Area Networks (WBAN) with frequent postural partitioning. A prototypeWBANhas been constructed for experimentally characterizing on-body topology disconnections in the presence of ultra short range radio links, unpredictable RF attenuation, and human postural mobility. On-body DTN routing protocols are then developed using a stochastic link cost formulation, capturing multi-scale topological localities in human postural movements. Performance of the proposed protocols are evaluated experimentally and via simulation, and are compared with a number of existing single-copy DTN routing protocols and an on-body packet flooding mechanism that serves as a performance benchmark with delay lower-bound. It is shown that via multi-scale modeling of the spatio-temporal locality of on-body link disconnection patterns, the proposed algorithms can provide better routing performance compared to a number of existing probabilistic, opportunistic, and utility-based DTN routing protocols in the literature.
authors.affiliation: Electrical and Computer Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, United States.
authors.forename: Muhannad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Quwaider
authors.affiliation: Electrical and Computer Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, United States.
authors.forename: Subir
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Biswas
keywords: Body area sensor networks; Delay tolerant networks; Multi-scale link locality; Probabilistic routing; Utility based routing