CAERM: Coverage Aware Energy Replenishment Mechanism Using Mobile Charger in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless charging is one of the most important issues in wireless sensor networks (WSNs), which aims to cope with the energy limitation problem of the sensors. Many of the existing researches applied the mobile charger to recharge the sensors for maintaining the perpetual lifetime of sensor networks. However, when choosing sensors to be recharged, the coverage contribution of sensors was ignored. This paper proposes a recharging scheme, called CAERM, which considers the coverage contribution of each requested sensor and constructs the recharging path to maximize the coverage of the whole networks. Two algorithms, including Simple Recharging Coverage Benefit (S-RCB) and Chain-Effect Recharging Coverage Benefit (CE-RCB) algorithms, are proposed to evaluate the coverage contribution of the requested sensors effectively. Through extensive simulations, experimental study shows that the proposed algorithm improves the recharging efficiency, while maximizing the coverage contribution and monitoring quality of the given sensor networks.

Automated summary

This paper introduces a wireless sensor network recharging scheme called CAERM, which considers the coverage contribution of sensors and utilizes two new algorithms to evaluate the coverage contribution effectively. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm enhances recharging efficiency, maximizes coverage contribution, and improves monitoring quality of sensor networks.