SURAN
The Survivable Radio Network project was sponsored by DARPA in the 1980s to develop a set of mobile ad hoc network radio-routers, then known as "packet radios". It was a follow-on to DARPA's earlier PRNET project. The program began in 1983 with the following goals:
A follow-on program in 1987, the Low-cost Packet Radio, attempted further innovations in mobile networking protocols, with design goals including:
- management of radio spreading codes for security, and increasing capacity
- new queue management and forwarding techniques for spread spectrum channels
- scalability based on dynamic clustering
BBN Technologies provided the MANET protocols, and Rockwell provided radio hardware. The prototype radios produced in these programs were known as VRC-99 radios, and were used by the Department of Defense throughout the 1990s for experimentation.
