Novel Energy-efficient Modified LEACH Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks

Introduction: In wireless sensor networks (WSNs), hierarchical clustered routing protocols play a crucial role in minimizing energy consumption. The Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy (LEACH) architecture is commonly employed for application-specific protocols in WSNs. However, the LEACH protocol may lead to increased energy consumption within the network if the rotational distribution of cluster heads (CHs) is not considered. Methods: A novel average energy, residual energy-based modified LEACH (aerem-LEACH) routing protocol for improving the WSN’s energy efficiency is proposed. This approach simultaneously considers the average energy of the networks and the residual node energy for routing, thereby reducing overall power consumption. Results: The suggested approach in aerem-LEACH accounts for optimal CHs numbers, and nodes in close proximity to the sink are forbidden from participating in cluster formation in order to achieve sufficient performance in the form of reduced sensor node energy consumption. Furthermore, a new threshold is employed in the proposed approach for selecting CHs for the network, and the aerem-LEACH uses free space, multiple hopping, and a hybrid communicating model for an energy-efficient network. Conclusion: The simulation result demonstrates that there is a substantial reduction in the consumption of energy in WSNs with the proposed aerem-LEACH routing protocol compared with existing routing protocols, namely Stable Energy Efficient Network (SEEN), Energy Efficient LEACH (EE LEACH), Optical LEACH (O-LEACH), LEACH-Mobile (LEACH-M), LEACHCentralized (LEACH-C), and LEACH for small-scale as well as large-scale sensor field.