VPP: A Communication Schema for Population Protocols in VANET

Abstract

Population protocols are a new paradigm that aims to model distributed systems composed of randomly interacting mobile agents. The main advantage of this model is that, when certain theoretical assumptions hold, it is possible to formally demonstrate their convergence. We consider the problem of adopting Population Protocols in a real-world scenario that does not guarantee these assumptions. In particular, we consider the application domain of Vehicular Ad-Hoc Networks (VANETs) which are characterized by dynamic network topologies, and where wireless communications can be affected by interferences and errors. In this work, we analyze the main features of VANET agents and the communications between them, and how these features can affect the performance of a Population Protocol. Based on the obtained results, we propose a communication schema that allows to preserve the formal properties of Population Protocols. Experimental results prove the suitability of our approach, regardless of the specific scenario considered.