Methods of cooperative routing to optimize the lifetime of multi-hop wireless sensor networks

• Main Author: Jung, Jin Woo
• Published: Georgia Institute of Technology 2013
• Subjects: Wireless sensor networks; Cooperative transmission; Cooperative routing; Wireless sensor nodes; Computer networks; Sensor networks; Routing (Computer network management)
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1853/47622

This dissertation presents methods of extending the network lifetime of multi-hop wireless sensor networks (WSNs) through routing that uses cooperative transmission (CT), referred to as cooperative routing. CT can have a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) advantage over non-CT schemes through cooperative diversity and simple aggregation of transmit power, and one of its abilities is to extend the communication range of a wireless device using this SNR advantage. In this research, we use the range-extension ability of CT as a tool to mitigate the energy-hole problem of multi-hop WSNs and extend the network lifetime. The main contributions of this research are (i) an analytical model for a cooperative routing protocol with a deployment method, (ii) cooperative routing protocols that can extend the network lifetime, and (iii) formulating the lifetime-optimization problem for cooperative routing. The analytical model developed in this research theoretically proves that, in a situation where non-CT routing cannot avoid the energy-hole problem, our CT method can solve the problem. PROTECT, a CT method based on the analytical model, provides a very simple way of doing cooperative routing and can improve the lifetime of non-CT networks significantly. REACT, a cooperative routing protocol that uses the energy information of nodes, overcomes some of the limitations of PROTECT and can be applied to any existing non-CT routing protocol to improve the network lifetime. Using REACT and analytical approaches, we also show that cooperative routing can be beneficial in multi-hop energy-harvesting WSNs. By formulating and solving the lifetime-optimization problem of cooperative routing, which requires a much more sophisticated formulation than that of non-CT routing, we explore the optimal lifetime bounds and behaviors of cooperative routing. Finally, we study and design online cooperative routing methods that can perform close to the optimal cooperative routing.