A pre-determined node deployment strategy to prolong network lifetime in wireless sensor network

Energy is one of the scarcest resources in a wireless sensor network (WSN). Therefore, the need to conserve energy is of utmost importance in WSN. There are many ways to conserve energy in such a network. One fundamental way of conserving energy is judicious deployment of sensor nodes within the network area so that the energy flow remains balanced throughout the network. This avoids the problem of occurrence of 'energy holes' and ensures prolonged network lifetime. We have investigated the problem of uniform node distribution and shown its incapability to deal with the energy hole problem. Next we have derived the principle of non-uniform node distribution that ensures energy balancing. Further, we have developed a non-uniform, location-wise pre-determined node deployment strategy based on this principle leading to an increase in network lifetime. Finally exhaustive simulation is performed to substantiate our claim of energy balancing and subsequent enhancement of network lifetime. The results are compared with an existing work to prove the efficacy of our scheme. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.