D2CRP: A Novel Distributed 2-Hop Cluster Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks

Typically, wireless sensor networks (WSNs) use limited-capacity batteries that cannot be recharged or replaced. In general, designing an energy-efficient routing protocol has a significant impact on prolonging network lifetime. In this paper, a novel Distributed 2-hop Cluster Routing Protocol (D2CRP) is introduced to achieve energy efficiency in WSNs. In the cluster formation phase, each node obtains the information of its neighbor nodes within the 2-hop range to form the 2-hop cluster in a fully distributed manner. The transmission distance and residual energy are jointly considered to determine the energy-efficient cluster head (CH) in each 2-hop cluster. After the CH is generated, each member node can transmit packets to its 1-hop neighbor or the CH directly. To reduce the overall transmission distance for inter-cluster communication, multiple chains can be formed among CHs via their adjacent CHs that are closer to the base station (BS). As a result, energy-efficient intra-cluster and inter-cluster routing can be achieved for packet transmission. In addition, the optimal cluster number of 2-hop clustering is formulated and derived to minimize the energy consumption for both intra-cluster and inter-cluster communications. Simulation results show that the optimal cluster number of D2CRP can be achieved and D2CRP is effectively improved on the performances of network lifetime, energy consumption, and packet transmission than the other four state-of-the-art competitive routing protocols including LEACH, R-LEACH, PEGASIS, and TTDFP.