Enhancing reliability by adoptive graph traversals for backbone-assisted communication in wireless sensor networks

Abstract

Some applications in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) require dedicated backbones for effective and faster delivery of data under the stringent network conditions. An inherent flaw of such networks is that with the failure of a relay node, the entire structure is affected and needs restructuring in the worst-case failures. In this paper, we try to enhance the capabilities of such types of networks in terms of reliability by providing spare routes for robust data delivery. Our approach is twofold. First, we estimate the reliability of the network through Markov model to show the improvement and effect on the reliability owing to employing ad hoc spare routes in the existing backbone structures. Second, we also propose and implement an adoptive relay selection (ARS) algorithm to confirm the improvement in the percentage of data delivery at the sink. Our analysis shows the improvement on the packet delivery ratio and the reliability under different failure conditions.