Energy optimization based on the redundancy in WSNs

Almost all WSNs (Wireless Sensor Networks) are deployed with some redundancy degree and redundancy is used only for robustness objectives. If not handled in an intelligent way, redundancy results in energy wasting because of (often unnecessary) redundant transmission and reception operations. We propose to take benefit from measurement redundancy to optimize the energy consumption and improve the end-to-end delay. We propose MR-LEACH (Measurement Redundancy aware LEACH) protocol, which is an extension to the well-known LEACH protocol to improve energy consumption in cluster-based WSNs. In addition to cluster formation according to LEACH protocol redundant nodes are grouped taking into account their redundancy and only a single node transmits data in each redundant group. This technique significantly improves the energy consumption and ensures a better end-to-end delay. Through intensive simulations, we discuss the performance of our approach and show how it outperforms the original LEACH protocol in terms of network lifetime and end-to-end delay.