M-ATTEMPT: A New Energy-Efficient Routing Protocol for Wireless Body Area Sensor Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces M-ATTEMPT, an energy-efficient, thermal-aware routing protocol for heterogeneous Wireless Body Area Sensor Networks that improves lifetime and reliability by supporting mobility and reducing energy consumption.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel routing protocol that combines thermal-awareness, mobility support, and energy efficiency specifically for WBASNs, with a linear programming model for optimization.

Findings

Reduced energy consumption compared to multi-hop communication

Enhanced reliability and lifetime of WBASNs

Effective thermal management to avoid hot-spots

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a new routing protocol for heterogeneous Wireless Body Area Sensor Networks (WBASNs); Mobility-supporting Adaptive Threshold-based Thermal-aware Energy-efficientMulti-hop ProTocol (M-ATTEMPT). A prototype is defined for employing heterogeneous sensors on human body. Direct communication is used for real-time traffic (critical data) or on-demand data while Multi-hop communication is used for normal data delivery. One of the prime challenges in WBASNs is sensing of the heat generated by the implanted sensor nodes. The proposed routing algorithm is thermal-aware which senses the link Hot-spot and routes the data away from these links. Continuous mobility of human body causes disconnection between previous established links. So, mobility support and energy-management is introduced to overcome the problem. Linear Programming (LP) model for maximum information extraction and minimum energy consumption is presented in this study. MATLAB simulations of proposed routing algorithm are performed for lifetime and successful packet delivery in comparison with Multi-hop communication. The results show that the proposed routing algorithm has less energy consumption and more reliable as compared to Multi-hop communication.