A clustering algorithm with reduced cluster head variations in LEACH protocol

摘要

Efficient utilisation of energy is a challenging issue in wireless sensor networks as the sensor nodes are battery operated. Cluster-based routing protocols help in achieving the goal of energy efficiency. Low energy adaptive clustering hierarchy (LEACH) is a cluster-based routing protocol, which increases both energy efficiency and scalability of the network. However, in LEACH protocol, high variation in cluster head count from the optimal value hampers the expected performance. In this paper, we propose an improvement over LEACH, called LEACH-MAC, which attempts to stabilise the number of cluster heads. Proposed approach also has been evaluated for different-base station locations to suit different applications requirements. Simulation results show that the proposed approach outperforms LEACH and LEACH-SWDN (LEACH with sliding window and dynamic number of nodes) protocol in all different-base station locations.