Energy Efficient Clustering and Cluster Head Rotation Scheme for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor nodes are highly energy constrained devices. They have limited battery life due to various constraints of sensor nodes such as size and cost, etc. Moreover, most of the Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) applications render it impossible to charge or replace the battery of sensor nodes. Therefore, optimal use of node energy is a major challenge in wireless sensor networks. Clustering of sensor nodes is an effective method to use the node energy optimally and prolong the lifetime of energy constrained wireless sensor network. In this paper, we propose a location based protocol for WSN- supporting an energy efficient clustering, cluster head selection/rotation and data routing method to prolong the lifetime of sensor network. Proposed clustering protocol ensures balanced size cluster formation within the sensing field with least number of transmit-receive operations. Cluster head rotation protocol ensures balanced dissipation of node energy despite the non-uniform energy requirements of cluster head and sensor nodes in a cluster. The cluster head rotation protocol has been proposed to achieve the balanced energy consumption among the nodes within the cluster thus prolonging the lifetime of network Simulation results demonstrate that proposed protocol prolongs network lifetime due to the use of efficient clustering, cluster head selection/rotation and data routing.