BCEE: A balanced-clustering, energy-efficient hierarchical routing protocol in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks together hundreds or thousands of sensor nodes to accurately monitor a remote environment. Considering severe resources constraints, it requires robust wireless communication protocols that are energy efficient and can provide longer lifetime, especially for routing protocol. In this paper, a balanced-clustering, energy-efficient hierarchical routing protocol is proposed, called BCEE, which operates in two phases. During Phase 1, the balanced cluster formation is achieved by applying k-means clustering strategy, called KMDC algorithm, which does not require exact position of each node but use RSSI instead. Then, ant colony optimization algorithm is used in Phase 2 to establish the route with optimal or sub-optimal power consumption between cluster heads and sink node. Simulation results show that our BCEE protocol can achieve better load-balance, offer significant reductions of energy consumption and prolong network lifetime hugely than LEACH.