Backbone Formation Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

A wireless sensor network (WSNs) are the spatially distributed sensors which are used to monitor the physical or environmental conditions. Such nodes after collecting the data co-operatively pass the data from one node to another and finally to the sink node. The wireless sensor network has a varied no. of applications from military applications such as battlefield surveillance, health care applications, the prevention of natural disasters, water pollution monitoring etc. Hence, WSN has now emerged to be a premier topic of research. In spite of the numerous applications of WSN they also face a number of challenges. A few challenges include energy constrained node deployment, lack of fixed topology, deployment in harsh environmental conditions etc. Hence, for an efficient and reliable design of such networks we require an architectural framework which counters the prevailing problems of WSN. The hierarchical framework formed for deployment of WSNs effectively overcomes the above discussed problem. In our work we have implemented the well known backbone formation algorithm which is a type of hierarchical framework for deployment of nodes. The backbone formation reduces the existing challenges of WSN deployment and has a number of advantages such as it reduces the communication overhead, increases the bandwidth efficiency, decreases the overall energy consumption, and, at last, increases network effective lifetime in a Wireless Sensor Network. In addition to this we further implemented three types of backbone based networks over two-dimensional and three-dimensional. The major reason for implementation in three-dimension is because the varied applications of WSN’s are mostly in three dimensional scenarios.