A method for creating balanced cluster areas in wireless sensor networks

Abstract

The balancing node energy is an important issue in sensor networks, since sensor nodes are deployed with a limited power in arbitrary regions. Clustering is one of the basic approaches for designing energy-efficient distributed sensor networks. In a representative clustering method, LEACH, cluster headers are elected based on a probability method. Therefore, cluster headers may be located by geographical randomness. Based on LEACH, there are some nodes which may do not belong within the transmission range of any cluster header or there are some nodes that are very far from their cluster header. The nodes that are far from their cluster header consume node energy quickly and it result in bad effects on working in sensor networks. The bad coverage of sensor networks gives a fatal effect on the QoS of the sensor application. In order to solve this problem, we propose a balanced clustering method that provides cluster headers to be geographically distributed evenly in entire clustered sensor networks. The experimental results show an excellent performance on the coverage of sensor networks and the life duration for the entire nodes of sensor networks.