A Novel Energy-Efficient Clustering Based Cooperative Spectrum Sensing for Cognitive Radio Sensor Networks

Cognitive radio has been proposed as a promising way to effectively utilize the scarce spectrum resources. A cognitive radio sensor network (CRSN) is a wireless sensor network that is equipped with cognitive radio capability. Clustering is a popular technique that can be applied to wireless sensor networks, although it has been proven to be a challenge to implement it in CRSNs. Moreover, few proposals have successfully applied energy-efficient clustering techniques in CRSNs. Therefore, with the aim of increasing energy efficiency, network lifetime, network stability, and optimal cluster-head selection process, this paper proposes a novel energy-efficient clustering based on cooperative spectrum sensing (ECS) for CRSNs. The proposed ECS scheme utilizes the concept of pairing among sensor nodes and switches between Awake and Sleep modes for energy efficiency. A comprehensive simulation in MATLAB was carried out to validate the proposed method. The simulation results show that, compared with conventional methods, the proposed method is more energy efficient and that the overall CRSN's lifetime is prolonged.