An Energy Balanced Dynamic Topology Control Algorithm for Improved Network Lifetime

TL;DR

This paper introduces EBTC, a distributed dynamic topology control algorithm that balances energy consumption among sensor nodes, significantly extending network lifetime by over 40% compared to previous methods.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel energy balancing topology control algorithm, EBTC, which considers actual energy use for transmissions to enhance network longevity.

Findings

EBTC increases network lifetime by over 40%.

The algorithm has comparable or lower complexity than existing methods.

It effectively balances energy consumption across nodes.

Abstract

In wireless sensor networks, a few sensor nodes end up being vulnerable to potentially rapid depletion of the battery reserves due to either their central location or just the traffic patterns generated by the application. Traditional energy management strategies, such as those which use topology control algorithms, reduce the energy consumed at each node to the minimum necessary. In this paper, we use a different approach that balances the energy consumption at each of the nodes, thus increasing the functional lifetime of the network. We propose a new distributed dynamic topology control algorithm called Energy Balanced Topology Control (EBTC) which considers the actual energy consumed for each transmission and reception to achieve the goal of an increased functional lifetime. We analyze the algorithm's computational and communication complexity and show that it is equivalent or lower in complexity to other dynamic topology control algorithms. Using an empirical model of energy consumption, we show that the EBTC algorithm increases the lifetime of a wireless sensor network by over 40% compared to the best of previously known algorithms.