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Survey of Extended LEACH-Based Clustering Routing Protocols for Wireless Sensor Networks
M. Aslam, N. Javaid, A. Rahim, U. Nazir, A. Bibi, Z. A. Khan
TL;DR
Wireless sensor networks require routing that manages limited energy while maintaining data delivery and network lifetime. This survey compares LEACH and extended hierarchical protocols, examining their mechanisms, features, and performance. The reported comparisons show longer lifetimes for solar-aware and multi-hop variants than for LEACH in the evaluated settings.
Problem
WSN routing must manage limited battery resources while coping with dynamic networks, overhead, limited transmission range, and other constraints that affect network lifetime and data delivery.
Method
The survey reviews and compares LEACH, solar-aware LEACH, M-LEACH, and Multi-Hop LEACH using analytical comparisons and simulation results.
Results
sLEACH provides 300% more network lifetime than LEACH, while M-LEACH provides 30% and Multi-hop LEACH almost 40% better network lifetime than LEACH.
Takeaways & Limitations
Solar-aware and multi-hop extensions improve supported network-lifetime outcomes over LEACH, while Multi-Hop LEACH offers the greatest scalability through multi-hop communication.
Abstract
from arXiv · showhide
An energy efficient routing protocol is the major concern in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). In this survey paper, we present energy efficient hierarchical routing protocols, developed from conventional LEACH routing protocol. Main focus of our study is how these extended protocols work in order to increase the life time and how quality routing protocol are improved for WSNs. Furthermore, this paper also highlights some of the issues faced by LEACH and also explains how these issues are tackled by extended versions of LEACH. We compare the features and performance issues of the selected hierarchal routing protocols.
I. INTRODUCTION
WSNs face routing challenges because nodes have limited batteries, computational resources, addressing, self-organization, and transmission range. The survey presents hierarchical routing, especially LEACH, as an energy-efficient approach that organizes nodes into clusters and rotates cluster-head duties.
- Motivation: Limited battery capacity makes resource management central to extending WSN lifetime.Routing is also complicated by dynamic networks, computational overhead, limited transmission range, and the absence of conventional addressing.
- Routing approaches: Hierarchical routing is identified as the most energy-efficient routing category, with LEACH serving as a basic protocol for later extensions.The survey compares modified LEACH protocols and their routing techniques.
- LEACH operation: LEACH divides nodes into clusters, assigns one cluster-head per cluster, and sends member-node data through the cluster-head to the sink.Cluster-heads aggregate and compress data before transmitting meaningful information to the sink.
- LEACH operation: Randomized cluster-head rotation prevents one node from bearing the extra cluster-head energy cost permanently.LEACH also uses scheduled communication and sleeping by non-cluster-head nodes to reduce energy dissipation.
- Energy-saving features: LEACH reduces sink transmissions, compresses transmitted data, rotates cluster-head duties, and allows non-cluster-head nodes to sleep.These features are presented as mechanisms for reducing energy dissipation and extending node lifetime.
B. Solar-aware Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy(sLEACH)
sLEACH extends LEACH for deployments where sensor nodes may harvest solar energy. It uses solar-powered nodes preferentially as cluster-heads and adapts handover behavior to harvested-energy conditions.
- Motivation: sLEACH targets applications where sensors operate in inaccessible areas and can use solar power to improve network lifetime.The paper specifically motivates energy harvesting for settings such as battlefields.
- Cluster-head selection: Solar-powered nodes receive preference for cluster-head roles because their harvested energy can support those duties.The protocol bases selection mainly on the nodes’ solar status.
- Adaptive operation: sLEACH can hand over the cluster-head role during steady-state operation when another node reports increased solar power.Network lifetime also depends on the duration for which energy is harvested.
1) Solar-aware Centralized LEACH:
Solar-aware distributed LEACH modifies cluster-head election so solar-driven nodes have a higher selection probability than battery-driven nodes. The modification multiplies the conventional threshold by a solar-awareness factor.
- Selection policy: Solar-aware distributed LEACH gives solar-driven nodes higher cluster-head selection probability than battery-driven nodes.The protocol changes the conventional LEACH election equation to encode this preference.
- Threshold modification: The modified threshold is T(n) = sf(n) × p, where sf(n) is the solar-awareness factor and p is the optimal cluster-head percentage.The factor is described as 4 for solar-driven nodes, while the battery-driven value is not specified in the passage.
- Selection variables: The selection calculation also tracks the number of cluster-heads since the last meta-round and the total number of nodes.These quantities appear alongside the solar-awareness factor and optimal cluster-head percentage.
C. Multi-hop LEACH
Multi-hop LEACH addresses the energy cost of single-hop cluster-head transmission when the network diameter grows. It lets cluster-heads forward aggregated data through other cluster-heads using a minimum-hop path to the base station.
- Motivation: Large network diameter can make single-hop cluster-head transmission to the base station prohibitively energy-intensive.Multi-hop LEACH is proposed to address this limitation of conventional LEACH.
- Communication architecture: Multi-hop LEACH supports intra-cluster communication from members to their cluster-head and inter-cluster communication among cluster-heads.Cluster-heads aggregate member data before transmitting directly or through other cluster-heads.
- Routing operation: The protocol selects a path with minimum hop-count between the originating cluster-head and the base station.This path-selection rule is part of its multi-hop communication architecture.
D. Mobile-LEACH (M-LEACH)
M-LEACH addresses LEACH’s uneven cluster membership and lack of mobility support by allowing node mobility and using residual energy in cluster-head selection.
- LEACH assumes homogeneous nodes, but uneven cluster membership can drain heavily loaded cluster-heads faster than lightly loaded ones.
- M-LEACH supports mobility for non-cluster-head nodes and cluster-heads during setup and steady-state phases.
- M-LEACH incorporates remaining node energy into cluster-head selection.
- M-LEACH assumes homogeneous antenna gain, GPS-based node location information, and a fixed base station.
III. CLASSIFICATION AND COMPARISON OF LEACH AND ITS MODIFIED ROUTING PROTOCOLS IN WIRELESS SENSOR
The survey compares LEACH variants across routing design and performance characteristics, including organization, mobility, scalability, hop structure, energy efficiency, and aggregation. The protocols share several common properties, while differing notably in cluster-head selection, base-station connectivity, and scalability.
- The comparison considers classification, mobility, scalability, self-organization, cluster-head rotation, clustering control, hop structure, energy efficiency, resources, aggregation, and homogeneity.
- Energy efficiency aims to maximize network lifetime, while data aggregation reduces the amount transmitted to the base station and cluster-head transmission energy.
- The compared protocols generally assume homogeneous nodes with similar initial energy levels.
- The table comparison reports common hierarchical routing, data aggregation, self-organization, and randomized cluster-head rotation across the selected protocols, with M-LEACH differing in base-station placement.
- LEACH, sLEACH, and M-LEACH use a single-hop base-station connection, whereas Multi-Hop LEACH permits multi-hop communication from cluster-heads.
- sLEACH provides good scalability, while Multi-Hop LEACH provides maximum scalability through multi-hop communication; LEACH and M-LEACH have limited scalability.
IV. ANALYTICAL COMPARISON FOR ENERGY EFFICIENCY OF ROUTING PROTOCOLS
The survey emphasizes that analytical energy comparisons depend on the radio-model assumptions used by each protocol. It therefore relates energy dissipation to transceiver operation, reception, transmission volume, and communication distance.
- Different radio-model assumptions can produce significant variation in the measured energy efficiency of routing protocols.
- A node’s energy dissipation depends on transmission count, reception count, transmitted data amount, and transmitter–receiver distance.
- The analysis first describes possible energy-consumption sources before comparing selected routing protocols and their energy-efficiency mechanisms.
A. Energy consumption
The energy-consumption analysis models communication costs across cluster members, cluster-heads, the base station, and duplex exchanges. It notes that setup-phase and continuous sensing costs are ignored when comparing clustering protocols.
- The analysis assumes uniformly distributed nodes and a free-space communication model between nodes and the base station for clustering protocols.
- Upward communication sends member-node data to cluster-heads, which aggregate and forward the data to the base station.
- Energy costs are considered for cluster-head transmission, non-cluster-head transmission, reception, aggregation, and distances to cluster-heads or the base station.
- Downward communication sends base-station instructions through cluster-heads to member nodes, imposing energy costs on cluster-heads and non-cluster-heads while ignoring base-station consumption.
- Setup-phase energy for cluster formation and TDMA scheduling, along with continuous sensing energy, is ignored when clustering protocols are compared.
B. Energy Efficiency of Clustering Routing Protocols
The comparison evaluates upward transmission energy, emphasizing how distance and multi-hop forwarding affect clustering efficiency. LEACH reduces dissipation through cluster-head aggregation, while Multi-hop LEACH shifts forwarding toward nearer cluster-heads.
- Upward transmission energy efficiency depends strongly on the distance between sensor nodes, cluster-heads, and the Base station.The comparison assumes nodes transmit toward the Base station through multiple cluster-heads.
- LEACH reduces energy dissipation by having member nodes transmit to nearby cluster-heads while only cluster-heads communicate directly with the Base station.The passage reports reductions relative to direct communication and minimum transmission, but its numeric wording is ambiguous across comparisons.
- Multi-hop LEACH forwards data from distant cluster-heads through nearer cluster-heads instead of requiring every cluster-head to transmit directly to the Base station.This reduces the transmission distance for remote cluster-heads but adds forwarding traffic to cluster-heads nearer the Base station.
- Multi-hop LEACH is more efficient for large network diameters, whereas LEACH is suitable when the network diameter is small.The nearer cluster-head receives a greater traffic burden in the multi-hop arrangement, while distant cluster-heads benefit from shorter transmissions.
V. SIMULATION RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
The simulations compare LEACH variants under a 100-node MATLAB setup and evaluate network lifetime, successful data delivery, and cluster-head behavior. Solar-aware and multi-hop extensions generally improve lifetime or quality, while distributed selection leaves cluster-head counts uncertain.
- Simulation setup: The MATLAB simulation used 100 uniformly scattered nodes in a 100m * 100m region and adjusted topology to reflect sensor behavior and solar-node re-energization.The setup compares LEACH, Multi-hop LEACH, M-LEACH, sLEACH-Centralized, and sLEACH-Distributed.
- Network lifetime: sLEACH achieved 300 % more network lifetime than LEACH, with the last node dying after 4000 rounds.sLEACH-Distributed was slightly better than sLEACH-Centralized, and adding more solar-driven nodes could further improve efficiency.
- Network lifetime: M-LEACH achieved 30 % better network lifetime than LEACH, while Multi-hop LEACH produced almost 40 % network life enhancement.The passage states that Multi-hop LEACH could improve further as network diameter increases.
- Routing quality: Multi-hop LEACH had better routing quality than LEACH because distant cluster-heads forward data through cluster-heads closer to the Base station.The study associates quality with successfully received data signals and identifies cluster-head count as an efficiency factor.
- Cluster-head selection: sLEACH-Centralized had better quality than sLEACH-Distributed because its central control algorithm selects cluster-heads at suitable locations for member nodes.The distributed schemes do not guarantee an optimal number of cluster-heads, and LEACH and M-LEACH show greater uncertainty across rounds.
VI. CONCLUSION
The survey examines LEACH and three extended hierarchical protocols through analytical and simulation-based comparisons of energy efficiency, throughput, lifetime, and data delivery. It concludes that further energy improvement remains possible, particularly through optimal guaranteed cluster-head selection.
- The survey discusses LEACH, Multihop LEACH, M-LEACH, and Solar-aware LEACH for wireless sensor networks.
- Analytical comparisons and simulations examine these protocols’ energy efficiency, throughput, lifetime, and data delivery characteristics.
- Further energy improvement is identified as possible through optimal guaranteed cluster-head selection.