Networks (wireless sensor networks) an important challenge of network design is maximising the network lifetime. In this study, the performance of the network is enhanced by proposing an adaptive immune‐inspired energy‐efficient cross‐layer routing (AIEECR) protocol. For data transmission, three layers are considered which include the physical layer, transport layer, and data link layer. For the clustering of sensor nodes, the K‐means approach is utilised. The cluster heads (CHs) are selected for each round, on the basis of the threshold value and so it will reduce the energy consumption. In addition to that adaptive sunflower optimisation (ASFO) is used for improving the coverage area and reduce the coverage hole issues. An artificial immune‐based routing protocol is used for selecting an efficient routing path for the transmission of data to the base station from every CH. The proposed AIEECR‐ASFO performance results are evaluated and also compared with the existing methods, which include dynamic multi‐objective routing algorithm, quality of service assured multi‐objective hybrid routing algorithm, and simple hybrid routing protocol. Average energy consumption, packet delivery ratio, jitter, throughput, and delay are considered for the comparison. The experimental outcomes prove that the proposed method outperforms the existing methods.

Abstract This paper aims to open a new vista of research in the direction of possible application of power electronics DC‐DC converters in analog chaotic communication. Most of the work reported on analog chaotic communication is based on the pioneer work of Pecora and Caroll, with synchronization between transmitter and receiver. Receiver based on synchronization, also known as coherent receiver, has a disadvantage of parameter mismatch and is sensitive to noise. In the present work, firstly, a secure transmitter using chaotic DC‐DC converters is proposed that encrypts information using chaotic switching map technique. In chaotic switching map technique, the message is encrypted by randomly switching from one chaotic converter to another. The bifurcation parameter of the randomly switched chaotic converter is modulated by the message. Secondly, an attempt has been made to design a robust non‐coherent receiver that is adaptable to the switching chaotic transmitters, even in the presence of noise. Once the receiver identifies the chaotic converter, it can decode the message as per the decryption algorithm. With the proposed non‐coherent receiver, the disadvantages of coherent receivers can be overcome. We have also devised a prototype smart meter, used in smart distribution grid for implementing the proposed communication technique. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Ad-hoc networks establish communication in improvised environments without requiring any fixed infrastructure. These networks are inherently prone to security attacks, with node mobility being the primary cause in allowing security breaches. Therefore secure routing is a must for such networks. A number of secure routing protocols based on trust have recently been proposed. However, all these protocols use the traditional route discovery model, where a node drops RREQ packet if its own ID is in the source route of the packet, or if it has previously processed the packet. A misbehaving node takes advantage of this vulnerability and forwards the RREQ fast, so that the RREQ received from other nodes are dropped and the path discovered includes itself (the misbehaving node). In this paper, we present a unique trust based method which is not vulnerable to this behavior. In our method, each node broadcasts a RREQ packet if it is received from different neighbors. A secure and efficient route to the destination is calculated as a weighted average of the trust value of the nodes in the route, with respect to its behavior observed by its neighboring nodes and the number of nodes in the route. We evaluate the misbehaving node detection rate and the efficiency of our method along a number of parameters. Results show that our method increases the throughput of the network while discovering a secure route.

Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) are comprised of highly mobile nodes that communicate with each other without relying on a pre-existing network infrastructure. Therefore they are ideally suited for use in rescue and emergency operations. These applications have increased security requirements with low acceptable delays, in order to provide high quality service. However, MANETs were not designed with security protection in mind and they are prone to several attacks. Communication in mobile ad hoc networks comprises of route discovery and data transmission phases.

There has been a lot of interest in the past decade in using timed Petri nets to model computer systems. In this paper we show how such timed Petri nets can be used to great advantage in describing and algebraically specifying communication system performance. We make use of the time parameter of timed Petri nets to model the delay in performing certain operations of a communication protocol. The specification is borrowed from the recently reported AFFIRM language, and the protocol chosen for illustration is the ECMA transfer protocol, proposed for the ISO reference model. However, the methodology can be used with other protocols as well. We also show how liveness properties can be specified, easily using timed Petri nets.