Electrostatic Modelling of Multiple Mobile Sinks in Wireless Sensor Networks

Sensor networks are constituted by cheap devices with limited energy supply. Therefore, it is crucial to design algorithms that optimize the energy usage of these devices and thus prolong the lifetime of the network. In this paper we present a novel method to deploy multiple sinks optimally in a sensor network, based on an electrostatic model. We assign positive or negative charges to sensor nodes depending on their energy level, and positive charges to sinks. Different charges attract each other, while charges of the same type shove each other. We show that, by properly setting these charges, the sink nodes can reach a position of equilibrium. Furthermore, we study how to move these mobile sinks during the operation of the network by dynamically changing the charges assigned to the sensor nodes and sinks. By comparing our adaptive strategy to three other solutions we show that it outperforms all the other approaches as far as network lifetime is concerned.