A Simple Scheme for Relative Time Synchronization in Delay Tolerant MANETs

In mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs), time synchronization can be achieved by distributing time information among nodes. This type of time synchronization, however, does not work well under considerable long delay caused by sparse population. In this paper, we propose a simple yet effective scheme for relative time synchronization. When two mobile nodes meet, they exchange their clock information and adjust their own clocks to the average. Through simulation experiments, we show that the variance of the difference between the local and reference times remains within a certain finite range that depends on the frequency of nodes' meetings.