Bluetooth network re-formation protocol for reducing path length (BNR)

Bluetooth is a short range wireless communication technology. Bluetooth's basic units called a piconet which provides point-to-point and point-to-multipoint transmissions. Multiple piconets can connect at the same time to make a bigger ad hoc network called a scatternet. Therefore, different piconet transmissions can be achieved through multi-hop. An inefficient topology may create the longest route between a source and destination in a scatternet, which consumes extra resources. It is also observed that the pair of source and destination is in proximity of each other but cannot communicate directly or through the shortest path due to Bluetooth inherited properties. The objective of this paper is to solve the problem of the longest route for pairs of devices in a Bluetooth scatternet. The proposed Bluetooth Network Re-formation Protocol (BNR) reducespath length by performing network re-structuring that reduces the number of hop counts. Simulation results show that the proposed protocol reduces end-to-end delay and consumes less system resources.