An adaptive energy-efficient area coverage algorithm for wireless sensor networks

• Published in: Ad hoc networks 2013-08, Vol.11 (6), p.1655-1666
• Main Author: Akbari Torkestani, Javad
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Algorithmics. Computability. Computer arithmetics; Algorithms; Applied sciences; Area coverage; Artificial intelligence; Cadmium sulfides; Computer science; control theory; systems; Computer systems and distributed systems. User interface; Degree-constrained CDS; Exact sciences and technology; Learning automata; Mathematical models; Minimum weight CDS; Networks; Protocol (computers); Radiocommunications; Remote sensors; Sensors; Software; Telecommunications; Telecommunications and information theory; Theoretical computing; Wireless networks; WSN
• ISSN: 1570-8705; 1570-8713
• DOI: 10.1016/j.adhoc.2013.03.002

The connected dominating set (CDS) concept has recently emerged as a promising approach to the area coverage in wireless sensor network (WSN). However, the major problem affecting the performance of the existing CDS-based coverage protocols is that they aim at maximizing the number of sleep nodes to save more energy. This places a heavy load on the active sensors (dominators) for handling a large number of neighbors. The rapid exhaustion of the active sensors may disconnect the network topology and leave the area uncovered. Therefore, to make a good trade-off between the network connectivity, coverage, and lifetime, a proper number of sensors must be activated. This paper presents a degree-constrained minimum-weight extension of the CDS problem called DCDS to model the area coverage in WSNs. The proper choice of the degree-constraint of DCDS balances the network load on the active sensors and significantly improves the network coverage and lifetime. A learning automata-based heuristic named as LAEEC is proposed for finding a near optimal solution to the proxy equivalent DCDS problem in WSN. The computational complexity of the proposed algorithm to find a 11-∊ optimal solution of the area coverage problem is approximated. Several simulation experiments are conducted to show the superiority of the proposed area coverage protocol over the existing CDS-based methods in terms of the control message overhead, percentage of covered area, residual energy, number of active nodes (CDS size), and network lifetime.