This paper studies and analyzes the clustering mechanism in LEACH routing protocol which is the first cluster-based routing protocol for wireless sensor networks. One of problems in the LEACH protocol is that it depends on the time period to re-establish new clusters among whole network without considering the differences of energy consumption between the various clusters. The paper proposes an improved LEACH protocol to solve the above problem. In improved LEACH protocol, after clusters are established, each cluster head decides whether to select a new cluster head, based on their energy consumption. The new cluster head will be the node having more residual energy. Thus, those clusters with less load can avoid the energy consumption resulted in selecting cluster head frequently. At the same time, it also can prevent the overloading of the cluster head node to fail. Simulation results show that the improved LEACH protocol effectively prolong the network lifetime and effectively improve node's energy efficiency.
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