Abstract: A method and apparatus for determining a node's proper duty cycle is provided herein. All nodes (500) within a network (100) will interactively switch duty-cycles based on a number of hops a device is from a personal area network coordinator PNC. Changing duty cycles based on a number of hops from a PNC assures that spatial patterns of duty-cycles form in a network to maximize data throughput and minimize network wide power consumptions.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for determining a node's proper duty cycle is provided herein. All nodes (500) within a network (100) will interactively switch duty-cycles based on a number of hops a device is from a personal area network coordinator PNC. Changing duty cycles based on a number of hops from a PNC assures that spatial patterns of duty-cycles form in a network to maximize data throughput and minimize network wide power consumptions.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for removing phantom children in an ad-hoc network is described herein. During operation messaging between the parent and child nodes allows the parent node to detect when a node has become a phantom node, and take action to correct it. In particular a maintenance message is periodically transmitted by every node in the network to its parent. The maintenance message is designed to inform the parent of at least a unique identifier of the child. The parent can then compare this unique identifier of the child to others associated with the parent to determine if the child is the real child or a phantom child. Corrective action is taken when a phantom node is detected.

Abstract: When a requesting node (402) has routing capabilities and attempts to join a network and there are no association slots available, the requesting node (402) will send an association message to a potential root node (401). If the root node (401) has reached the maximum number of links, and has a non-routing capable node (403) associated with it, the root node (401) will send a message to the non-routing capable node (403), instructing it to disassociate and attempt to re-associate at a later time. A message is then sent to the requesting node (402) for it to associate with the root node (401).

Abstract: In order to set up efficient routes between two closely-located nodes an optimized route for two nodes within a hybrid-cellular network (HCN) is achieved by converting an HCN route to an ad-hoc route. Thus, a node within the communication system may originally be communicating with another node via an HCN route and then instructed to switch to a more efficient ad-hoc route for communication with the node.