Alternative Path Communication in Wide-Scale Cluster-Tree Wireless Sensor Networks Using Inactive Periods

Abstract

The IEEE 802.15.4/ZigBee cluster-tree topology is a suitable technology to deploy wide-scale Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). These networks are usually designed to support convergecast traffic, where all communication paths go through the PAN (Personal Area Network) coordinator. Nevertheless, peer-to-peer communication relationships may be also required for different types of WSN applications. That is the typical case of sensor and actuator networks, where local control loops must be closed using a reduced number of communication hops. The use of communication schemes optimised just for the support of convergecast traffic may result in higher network congestion and in a potentially higher number of communication hops. Within this context, this paper proposes an Alternative-Route Definition (ARounD) communication scheme for WSNs. The underlying idea of ARounD is to setup alternative communication paths between specific source and destination nodes, avoiding congested cluster-tree paths. These alternative paths consider shorter inter-cluster paths, using a set of intermediate nodes to relay messages during their inactive periods in the cluster-tree network. Simulation results show that the ARounD communication scheme can significantly decrease the end-to-end communication delay, when compared to the use of standard cluster-tree communication schemes. Moreover, the ARounD communication scheme is able to reduce the network congestion around the PAN coordinator, enabling the reduction of the number of message drops due to queue overflows in the cluster-tree network.

Improving Route Selections in ZigBee Wireless Sensor Networks

“…In fact, ZigBee contains procedures specifically tailored for many-to-one communications [4], in which several nodes transmit data to a single concentrator node, which is a typical scenario in wireless sensor networks. Although there are many products already using the ZigBee protocol, the ZigBee Alliance is still actively developing future versions [5,6], and there is still interest on ZigBee from a research perspective [7][8][9][10][11][12]. In this paper, we focus on one particular aspect that the ZigBee specifications do not fully specify: the estimation of the probability of successful transmission on a link.…”

Evidence-Efficient Multihop Clustering Routing Scheme for Large-Scale Wireless Sensor Networks

“…Additionally, some of the existing clustering routing algorithms [3,7,10,13,14] did not consider the residual energy and the deployment location of nodes; in response to this deficiency several researches are carried out in the EBAPC algorithm [18]. The EBAPC algorithm defined a new concept of fitness factor and employed the strategy of cluster center determination in AP algorithm [24].…”

“…Obviously, due to EEMCR scheme taking into account several network factors, the distribution of the determined CHs is reasonable and the scale of clusters is relatively appropriate; in contrast, the CH distribution using LEACH algorithm is random and the cluster size is too large. Furthermore, to validate the influence of the proposed clustering and backbone construction algorithm on the performance, we fundamentally implement the LEACH [21], LEACH-C [13] and CMRAOL [14] algorithms, respectively. Additionally, through casting the proposed CH rotation mechanism and minimum aggregation tree generation instead of the original ones in the LEACH algorithm, the hybrid results are expressed as LEACH-CS and LEACH-MT, respectively.…”

“…In comparison with multipath routing, its transmission has generally been considered an efficient energy-saving approach, especially for large-scale sensor networks [3,7,10,14,16]. The most commonly used multihop topology is the aggregation tree rooted at the sink [22].…”

“…The related technique-efficient issues, such as clustering routing, topology control, and multihop transmission, are widely used to improve energy efficiency for WSNs [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. On the other hand, it is very important to note that hybridization combination of various approaches may affect total performance.…”