The invention discloses a method and
system for establishing and maintaining a backbone subnet in a
mobile ad hoc network, and the method comprises the steps: dividing nodes in a network into different node types according to a current state, and enabling the node types to comprise an assigned node, an isolated node, a common node and a backbone node; the backbone node periodically broadcasts the
beacon, and the surrounding nodes of the backbone node perform node conversion according to the received backbone node
beacon; if the isolated node receives the
beacon of the backbone node, the isolated node becomes a common node; if the backbone node beacon is not received within the preset time, the isolated node is changed into a backbone node after
timeout; if the common nodes receive the backbone node beacons, the common nodes become backbone nodes based on self-election according to the backbone node beacons; and the backbone node judges whether redundancy exists or not according to the received beacons of other backbone nodes, and if yes, the backbone node is changed into a common node based on self-
cutting. According to the invention, the
network overhead is reduced, and efficient networking and transmission are realized.