Intelligent firefly-based algorithm with Levy distribution (FF-L) for multicast routing in vehicular communications

Vehicular ad hoc network (VANET) is an interesting technology used to attain inter-vehicle communication in intelligent transportation system (ITS). In VANET, the timely and unfailing vehicular communication is an important challenge to achieved good service. So, efficient routing techniques are highly needed for proper data transmission in VANET. In this paper, we concentrate on the quality of service (QoS) constrained multicast routing problem by considering it as an NP-complete problem. Several studies reported that bio-inspired algorithms work well than the traditional algorithms to resolve the NP-complete problem. So, a firefly with Levy distribution (FF-L) algorithm is presented to manage the multicast routing problem. To prevent the FF algorithm stuck into local optima, Levy distribution is incorporated to the FF algorithm. The FF-L algorithm for multicasting routing in VANET is validated using a set of experiments on three different scenarios. The experimental values verified that the FF-L algorithm identifies the optimal routes and it can be implemented in practical scenarios where the network structure remains quite stable.