A performance modeling of connectivity in Vehicular Ad hoc NETworks

In this paper, we study the statistical properties of the connectivity of Vehicular Ad hoc NETworks (VANETs) with user mobility. It is assumed that the nodes travel along a multilane highway that allows vehicles to pass each other. The nodes arrive at the highway through one of the traffic entry points according to a Poisson process and then travel in the same direction according to a user mobility model until they reach their exit points. The nodes on the highway may be able to communicate with each other. We derive the probability distribution of the node population size on the highway and the node's location distribution. Then, we determine the mean cluster size and the probability that the nodes will form a single cluster. The analysis of this paper also applies to any path in a network of highways, as well as to two-way traffic. The numerical results show the significance of mobility on the connectivity of VANETs. We also present simulation results that confirm the accuracy of the analysis. The results of this paper may be used to study the routing algorithms, throughput, or delay in VANETs.