A Tactical Packet Radio Network Utilizing Nomadic Routers

The rapid growth in military command and control systems in this decade has resulted in the need for increased multimedia communication services for the battlefield. Furthermore, tactical communications of the future must be conducted in a network that collectively supports highly mobile combat elements and consists of unreliable radios and RF links. The Phase I project will provide the network software that allows radios using direct-sequence spread-spectrum signaling to operate as nomadic routers and to be organized into a mobile packet radio network that can dynamically adapt to battlefield conditions. New channel-access and network protocols are implemented that provide reliable, survivable communications in a highly mobile, multi-hop, packet radio network which operates in a distributed manner without the need for a backbone structure or hierarchical organization. Furthermore, the protocols support the reliable distribution of multimedia traffic. A novel aspect of the proposed work is that side information which is extracted from elements of the communication receiver, including the demodulator and decoder, is employed to characterize the link quality. The link quality information is incorporated into the protocols to improve the quality of the links and aid the forwarding, routing, and transmission protocols.