A Study on routing optimization of Wireless Sensor Networks using an Enhanced LEACH protocols

Abstract

The LEACH routing protocol equalizes network power consumption by randomly selecting cluster headnodes in a loop, which will cause network malfunctions. Therefore, to solve this problem, it is necessary to reduce the data transmission energy consumption in the routing protocol and increase the network life cycle. However, there is also the problem that cluster headers have a wide range, and forwarding data from cluster headers consumes a lot of power in LEACH, which has not yet been resolved. In this article, we present an approach to optimize the routing protocol. First, the optimal number of cluster heads is calculated according to the total energy consumption per round to reduce the probability of excessive distribution of cluster heads. The cluster head is then used as the nucleus to construct the Voronoi diagram. Nodes in the same Voronoi diagram become a cluster, so the energy consumption of intra-cluster communication would be lower. Finally, to optimize the multi-hop routing protocol, an ant colony algorithm is added using a cluster header close to the BS to receive and forward it from a remote cluster header. Based on MATLAB simulation data, the protocol can significantly extend the lifetime of WSNs compared to the LEACH protocol and increase the energy efficiency per node unit per round. The energy consumption of the proposed approach is unique. The approach improved first node kill time (FND) by 127%, 22.2%, and 14.5% relative to LEACH, LEACH-C, and SEP, respectively.