An energy-efficient data transfer model of wireless sensor networks based on the coalitional game theory

Energy consumption is one of the most important factors in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Data transfer of sensor nodes makes great impact on the energy consumption of WSNs. To reduce the energy consumption, some nodes in a WSN form a coalition by transferring data coordinately instead of transferring alone. In this paper, we consider obtaining the method for data transfer strategies that can be specified as the proportion of the data sent by a node and that of the data forwarded by a node. First, we form the WSN coalitions based on Markov-process, and propose the concept of absorption coefficient to measure the coalitional profiles. Then, we use Nash equilibrium to determine the approximate data transfer strategies of the formed coalitions. Preliminary results of our simulation experiments show that the model proposed in this paper is effective to reduce the energy consumption of WSNs.