In this paper we introduce the regional consecutive leader election (RCLE) problem, which extends the classic leader election problem to the ever-changing environment of mobile ad-hoc networks. We assume that mobile nodes, including the currently elected leader, can fail by crashing, and might enter or exit the region of interest at any time. We require the existence of certain paths, which, together with our synchrony assumption, stipulates a bound on the propagation of information within the region. We present and prove correct an algorithm that solves RCLE for a fixed region in 2 or 3-dimensional space. Our algorithm does not rely on the knowledge of the total number of nodes in the system nor on a common startup time. In the second part of the paper, we introduce a specific mobility pattern that is sufficient to ensure the existence of the paths required by our RCLE algorithm.
Hyun Chul Chung, Peter Robinson, Jennifer L. Welch