Energy Saving in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

With the development of low-cost processor, memory, and radio technologies, it becomes possible to build inexpensive wireless micro-sensor nodes. However, energy is the biggest constraint to wireless sensor capabilities and such constraint combined with a typical deployment of large numbers of sensor nodes have posed many challenges to management of sensor networks. Due to the design and their ad-hoc deployment in hazardous environment, once sensor nodes are deployed in a sensor network, they cannot be easily replaced or recharged. Thus, energy saving acts as one of the hottest topics in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and hence several energy conservation schemes have been proposed in the literature. In this work, we will make a short survey on the main techniques used for energy conservation in sensor networks. Specifically, we will focus primarily on duty cycling schemes which represent the most suitable technique for energy saving. Moreover, we will also survey in-network processing and network coding techniques which can guarantee a significant amount of energy saving in packet transmission. Finally, we will make a review on some communication protocols proposed for sensor networks.