Effects of beamforming on the connectivity of Ad Hoc networks

Abstract

This paper analyzes the effects of beamforming on the connectivity of wireless ad hoc networks. We study different beamforming techniques using the uniform circular array as the antenna model. In particular, we study centre directed beamforming and greedy beamforming. In centre directed beamforming each node points its main beam toward the geometric centre of the network. The greedy beamforming method allows each node to choose the beamforming direction based on knowledge of other node positions. We investigate the connectivity of each beamforming scheme and compare their performances to that of omnidirectional antennas. The percentages of connection and isolated nodes are used as metrics for connectivity. We also show that greedy beamforming is robust against errors in node position information. Show more