A framework for collaborative multi class heterogeneous wireless sensor networks

For many applications, simultaneous sensing of a number of parameters is crucial that leads to the deployment of multiple classes of sensors having different initial energy, data generation rate and deployment density within the vicinity of a cluster as opposed to identical sensors assumed in the existing heterogeneous sensor networks. For data transmission to cluster head, such networks use single hop, multi hop and their hybrid as intra-cluster transmission policy which suffer highly from non-uniform energy usage among sensors, thereby reducing the lifetime drastically leaving considerable amount of energy in many nodes. In this paper, we propose a framework for multi-class heterogeneous sensor networks where incoming traffic is relayed towards cluster head in collaboration among multiple classes of sensors considering their heterogeneity. We also propose two transmission policies for this framework considering generic polygonal cluster and limited transmission range for individual sensors. Performance analysis shows substantial improvement of overall lifetime by the collaborative framework of multi-class sensors. Our proposed transmission policies further improve the lifetime over existing multi hop and hybrid communications through better distribution of energy usage among sensors.