Reliable energy-efficient routing with novel route update in wireless sensor networks

In this paper we introduce a novel energy-aware routing protocol REPU （reliable, efficient with path update）, which provides reliability and energy efficiency in data delivery. REPU utilizes the residual energy available in the nodes and the received signal strength of the nodes to identify the best possible route to the destination. Reliability is achieved by selecting a number of intermediate nodes as waypoints and the route is divided into smaller segments by the way-points. One distinct advantage of this model is that when a node on the route moves out or fails, instead of discarding the whole original route, only the two way-point nodes of the broken segment are used to find a new path. REPU outperforms traditional schemes by establishing an energy-efficient path and also takes care of efficient route maintenance. Simulation results show that this routing scheme achieves much higher performance than the classical routing protocols, even in the presence of high node density, and overcomes simultaneous packet forwarding.