Energy efficient cluster head selection scheme: A change in node death scenario of LEACH for surveillance wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks are energy constraint networks. Energy efficiency, to prolong the network for a longer time is critical issue for wireless sensor network protocols. Clustering is an efficient approach to capitalize the energy of sensor nodes in wireless sensor networks. LEACH is a fully distributed clustering scheme that chooses cluster head randomly from the nodes. In LEACH though node death is random but it is observed that border area nodes die first. But critical field surveillance application requires border nodes to function for much longer time period. In this paper, a cluster head selection scheme is proposed and implemented with LEACH. Proposed scheme divides the network area into two parts: Border area nodes and Inner area nodes. High energy consuming cluster head role is restricted to only inner area nodes. The scheme reduces intra-cluster communication distance and hence increases the energy efficiency of LEACH. Simulation results for proposed scheme shows that border nodes function for longer time as compared to LEACH.