Energy Optimized Path Selection in Cluster Based Routing for Wireless Mesh Network

An Energy efficient routing protocol is one of the major concerns of Wireless Mesh Networks(WMN). Nodes of WMN works based on the limited battery power routing protocol has to be designed such that it utilize minimum battery power and route the data efficiently and thus maximize the overall life time of the network. Many existing works shows the efficient usage of battery during the selection of Cluster Head(CH) in clusters. To increase the lifetime, provide scalability and energy efficiency during routing we propose energy optimized path selection protocol that uses Draining Rate (DR) as parameter. The proposed Maximum Remaining energy Minimum Draining rate - Cluster Head(MRMD-CH) selection protocol selects CH based on the maximum remaining energy(Max RE) and minimum battery draining rate (Min DR) of energy resource. The protocol predicts nodes draining rate and based on the result obtained it selects the CH with sufficient energy and low energy depletion rate. The Protocol is evaluated under static nature of nodes. Simulation is carried out in NS3 and results shows that the proposed model efficiently uses the limited battery power of WMN and results in increase in the lifetime of network.