QoS-Aware Minimum Cost Routing Algorithm for Wireless Body Area Networks

摘要

Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs) are a subclass of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN), which can be used for gathering patient's critical data for diagnosing various diseases at an early stage. There are many routing challenges need to be addressed in WBAN like WSN, one of them is the selection of the next forwarding node or a next-hop node towards the sink. In this paper, a new routing algorithm called Minimum Cost Routing Algorithm (MCRA) is introduced based on a cost function which comprises of link reliability, queue size, remaining energy, the distance between the two nodes and the residual bandwidth. Using this new cost function, the next best hop node is selected which can send the data to the sink using a reliable and efficient path which improves the Quality of Service (QoS) essentials of the sensor network. The proposed algorithm is thoroughly evaluated using the NS-2 Simulator. The efficacy of MCRA method is proved in terms of packet delivery ratio, dropping ratio, throughput, average end-to-end delay, average energy consumed and normalized overheads when compared with the existing routing protocols for healthcare body sensor applications.