A Coverage Maintenance Algorithm for Mobile WSNs With Adjustable Sensing Range

The work of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) depends on reliable coverage of the area to be monitored. The problem of coverage holes arises when one or more nodes fail due to energy depletion or harsh physical environments. Furthermore, random deployment of nodes could lead to a high degree of overlapping coverage among the sensor nodes. While there are many research papers on optimal deployment of sensor nodes, coverage holes that appear post-deployment are not often considered. In this paper, we propose an algorithm that employs adjustable sensing ranges and exploits node mobility to repair emergent coverage holes. The algorithm selects suitable nodes by gauging the degree of overlap and the residual energy of each node in the vicinity of the coverage hole. We have evaluated the performance of the algorithm via simulation, and compared with baseline approaches in terms of coverage performance and energy cost. Simulations have shown that our approach outperforms others in terms of coverage and network lifetime.