Patent ID: 7693119

Claim:
A method for controlling transmission power on a node over a wireless ad-hoc network which includes a plurality of sender, intermediate and receiver nodes, the method comprising: (A) configuring transmission power levels of the node; (B) exchanging information with neighboring nodes by sending out a global signal; (C) identifying a node coverage for each of the transmission power levels; (D) determining effective transmission power (ETP); and (E) utilizing the ETP to form a virtual cluster, wherein step (B) comprises: (a) determining if it is the turn for the node to send the global signal at each possible global signaling time; (b) recording the receiving power of the global signal as recorded receiving power if it is not the turn for the node to send the global signal; (c) sending the global signal if it is the turn for the node to send the global signal; (d) determining whether a cycle of the global signal is ended; and (e) repeating the steps of (a)-(d) if the cycle of the global signal is not ended.