A framework for analyzing the performance of distributed lifetime-efficient routing schemes in wireless sensor networks

This paper is concerned with energy-efficient routing in wireless sensor networks. Most of the existing routing schemes assign energy-related costs to network links and obtain shortest paths for the nodes in order to balance the flowing traffic within the network and increase the lifetime. However, the optimal link cost values and the maximum achievable lifetime are not known for this vast category of schemes. A framework is provided in this work to analytically derive the best achievable performance by any distributed routing algorithm based on the shortest-path approach. Given a network configuration and an energy consumption model, the presented framework provides the optimal link cost assignment which yields the maximum lifetime in a distributed shortest-path routing strategy. The results are extended to the case of variable link cost assignment as well. In particular, the proposed framework provides the optimal route selection as a benchmark to evaluate the energy efficiency of existing routing algorithms.