A study of information dissemination under multiple random walkers and replication mechanisms

Random walk-based approaches are suitable for information dissemination in mobile and opportunistic environments that are inherently dynamic and typically large-scale. Multiple random walkers have been proposed in the recent past as a suitable mechanism to significantly reduce termination time when covering a network topology. In this paper, the multiple random walkers mechanism is studied and analyzed under a different and novel perspective that allows for further understanding of network coverage when employing multiple random walkers in a network. Given that under this mechanism the number of movements is significantly increased (proportional to the number of random walkers) -- and sometimes not as effective as expected due to frequent revisits that do not improve coverage as shown in this paper -- a replication mechanism is introduced that is capable of reducing the number of movements by reducing initial revisits. Simulation results considering geometric random graph topologies -- which are suitable for modeling mobile environments -- are also presented supporting the analytical findings and shedding more light on various aspects of both the aforementioned mechanisms.