An energy balanced cluster algorithm for wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks are prone to partitioning because of limited energy in sensor nodes. In this paper, a new cluster algorithm will be proposed in order to use the energy more effectively and prolong the lifetime of wireless sensor networks. Firstly, to reduce the energy consumption during the cluster building, the parameters such as node energy, distances between nodes and the numbers of neighbor nodes are used in the stages of cluster heads selection and clusters building to balance the load distribution. Also the conditions are set to induce the frequency of cluster rebuilding. And then the data transmission path between intra-cluster and inter-cluster are set. At last, to solve the problem of the delay bringing by multiple hops transmission, TDMA schedule is also reset. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can not only effectively reduce the frequency of network reconstruction, but also can balance energy consumption and prolong the lifetime of the networks.