Impact of network size on the performance of Wireless Networked Control Systems over Mobile Ad-hoc Network

Wireless Networked Control Systems (WNCS) over Mobile Ad-hoc Network (MANET) is a new area of research and has many potential applications, for instance, military or rescue missions, exploring hazardous environments etc. For performance evaluation, researchers mostly rely on computer simulations as WNCS experiments are expensive to execute. The size of the wireless network i.e. number of nodes plays a vital role on the performance of the WNCS over MANET. This paper explores the effect of the network size on the performance of a WNCS using co-simulation that utilises SIMULINK and OPNET to simulate plant/controller behaviour and the MANET respectively. It investigates the impact of network data rates, node mobility, the packet delay, packet drop on the system stability and performance.