Load Balancing in Wireless Sensor Networks using Multiple Cluster Heads

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) operate in an energy constrained environment. Prudent approaches that minimize energy usage and consequently maximize network up-time are a subject of much research. Load balancing is a paradigm whose primary aim is to improve network lifetime by balancing the amount of work done by nodes in a network. In this work, we present a novel and simple technique to balance the work done by Cluster Heads (CHs) in clustered WSNs. In most clustered WSNs, CHs take up a majority of the routing and processing work and hence run out of energy sooner. Our proposed approach shares the responsibility of a CH among other non CH nodes in a cluster provided they are comparable to the CH on the CH selection criteria. We built on this idea and using a heuristic approach, built an algorithm that divides workload equally among a CH and some non CHs in a cluster. The selected non CHs are nearly as good as the CH. We tested our implementation on LEACH clustering algorithm. Results show balanced energy utilization and substantial increase in network lifetime.