An energy and distance based clustering protocol for wireless sensor networks

This paper proposes an energy-efficient clustering protocol for wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Unlike LEACH and other existing clustering protocols, the proposed clustering protocol considers both the residual energy of a sensor node and the distance between the sensor node and the sink in electing a cluster head and a sensor node with more residual energy and closer to the sink has a higher probability to become a cluster head. Simulation results show that compared with LEACH the proposed clustering protocol can better balance the energy consumption among sensor nodes, and can thus effectively reduce the energy consumption and prolong the lifetime of a WSN.