Practical Data Transmission in Cluster-Based Sensor Networks

Data routing in wireless sensor networks must be energy-efficient because tiny sensor nodes have limited power. A cluster-based hierarchical routing is known to be more efficient than a flat routing because only cluster-heads communicate with a sink node. Existing hierarchical routings, however, assume unrealistically large radio transmission ranges for sensor nodes so they cannot be employed in real environments. In this paper, by considering the practical transmission ranges of the sensor nodes, we propose a clustering and routing method for hierarchical sensor networks: First, we provide the optimal ratio of cluster-heads for the clustering. Second, we propose a d-hop clustering scheme. It expands the range of clusters to d-hops calculated by the ratio of cluster-heads. Third, we present an intra-cluster routing in which sensor nodes reach their cluster-heads within d-hops. Finally, an inter-clustering routing is presented to route data from cluster-heads to a sink node using multiple hops because cluster-heads cannot communicate with a sink node directly. The efficiency of the proposed clustering and routing method is validated through extensive simulations.