We consider the fault-tolerant consensus problem in radio networks with crash-prone nodes. Specifically, we develop lower
bounds and matching upper bounds for this problem in single-hop radios networks, where all nodes are located within broadcast
range of each other. In a novel break from existing work, we introduce a collision-prone communication model in which each
node may lose an arbitrary subset of the messages sent by its neighbors during each round. This model is motivated by behavior
observed in empirical studies of these networks. To cope with this communication unreliability we augment nodes with receiver-side
collision detectors and present a new classification of these detectors in terms of accuracy and completeness. This classification is motivated
by practical realities and allows us to determine, roughly speaking, how much collision detection capability is enough to
solve the consensus problem efficiently in this setting. We consider nine different combinations of completeness and accuracy
properties in total, determining for each whether consensus is solvable, and, if it is, a lower bound on the number of rounds
required. Furthermore, we distinguish anonymous and non-anonymous protocols—where “anonymous” implies that devices do not
have unique identifiers—determining what effect (if any) this extra information has on the complexity of the problem. In all
relevant cases, we provide matching upper bounds.
Keywords Wireless ad hoc networks - Consensus - Collision detectors - Fault-tolerance
This work is supported by MURI–AFOSR SA2796PO 1-0000243658, USAF–AFRL #FA9550-04-1-0121, NSF Grant CCR-0121277, NSF-Texas
Engineering Experiment Station Grant XS64961-CS, and DARPA F33615-01-C-1896.