A hierarchical packet forwarding mechanism for energy harvesting wireless sensor networks

Energy harvesting technologies have gained widespread attention for their perpetual energy supply for sensor nodes. However, the energy resources are still insufficient while the harvesting module is added on the node. To prolong the network lifetime and meet the demand of a green wireless network, a dynamic gradient-aware hierarchical packet forwarding mechanism is designed. According to the relative positions of nodes, gradient-aware clusters are established. Consequently, considering the energy conversion efficiency and relative distance, cluster heads are selected reasonably. Furthermore, by exploiting the available energy and the number of cluster members, packets can be forwarded to the sink in an energy-efficient manner. Results show that the network lifetime can be noticeably improved.