Energy-aware routing protocols in wireless sensor networks

Saving energy and increasing network lifetime are significant challenges in the field of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). Energy-aware routing protocols have been introduced for WSNs to overcome limitations of WSN including limited power resources and difficulties renewing or recharging sensor nodes batteries. Furthermore, the potentially inhospitable environments of sensor locations, in some applications, such as the bottom of the ocean, or inside tornados also have to be considered. ZigBee is one of the latest communication standards designed for WSNs based on the IEEE 802.15.4 standard. The ZigBee standard supports two routing protocols, the Ad hoc On-demand Distance Vector (AODV), and the cluster-tree routing protocols. These protocols are implemented to establish the network, form clusters, and transfer data between the nodes. The AODV and the cluster-tree routing protocols are two of the most efficient routing protocols in terms of reducing the control message overhead, reducing the bandwidth usage in the network, and reducing the power consumption of wireless sensor nodes compared to other routing protocols. However, neither of these protocols considers the energy level or the energy consumption rate of the wireless sensor nodes during the establishment or routing processes. (Continues...)

Reducing the transmission and reception powers in the AODV

The transmission power and the reception power are the main source of energy consumption in wireless sensor nodes. Therefore, reducing the amount of consumed power through the transmission and reception processes in the routing protocol will lead to an increase in the lifetime of the wireless sensor network and distribute the consumed power among the wireless sensor nodes. This paper proposes a mechanism to reduce the transmission and reception power for the frequently used nodes. This proposed techniques and a hybrid technique with the power consumption distribution technique in have been compared to the original Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) routing protocol. Simulation results based on NS-2 showed that the hybrid technique and the proposed mechanism have better performance than the original AODV routing protocol. The new mechanism and the hybrid technique have increased the lifetime of the wireless sensor network by around 40%, and 70% respectively