Lifetime Maximization in Wireless Sensor Networks with Network Coding

The lifetime is a critical parameter for wireless sensor networks, which is defined as the maximum time of delivering certain data to the sink node before sensor node runs out of energy under an initial energy is given. In this paper, we propose a distributed algorithm for data gathering in wireless sensor networks with the assistance of network coding, such that the network lifetime is maximized. We prove rigorously that the proposed algorithm converge to the optimal solution of regularized problem.