Distance-Based Queuing for Scalable and Reliable Linear Wireless Sensor Networks in Smart Cities.

The reliability and scalability of Linear Wireless Sensor Networks (LWSNs) are limited by the high packet loss probabilities (PLP) experienced by the packets generated at nodes far from the sink node. This is an important limitation in Smart City applications, where timely data collection is critical for decision making. Unfortunately, previous works have not addressed this problem and have only focused on improving the network's overall performance. In this work, we propose a Distance-Based Queuing (DBQ) scheme that can be incorporated into MAC protocols for LWSNs to improve reliability and scalability without requiring extra local processing or additional signaling at the nodes. The DBQ scheme prioritizes the transmission of relay packets based on their hop distance to the sink node, ensuring that all packets experience the same PLP. To evaluate the effectiveness of our proposal, we developed an analytical model and conducted extensive discrete-event simulations. Our numerical results demonstrate that the DBQ scheme significantly improves the reliability and scalability of the network by achieving the same average PLP and throughput for all nodes, regardless of traffic intensities and network sizes.

Performance Analysis of Cluster Formation in Wireless Sensor Networks.

Clustered-based wireless sensor networks have been extensively used in the literature in order to achieve considerable energy consumption reductions. However, two aspects of such systems have been largely overlooked. Namely, the transmission probability used during the cluster formation phase and the way in which cluster heads are selected. Both of these issues have an important impact on the performance of the system. For the former, it is common to consider that sensor nodes in a clustered-based Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) use a fixed transmission probability to send control data in order to build the clusters. However, due to the highly variable conditions experienced by these networks, a fixed transmission probability may lead to extra energy consumption. In view of this, three different transmission probability strategies are studied: optimal, fixed and adaptive. In this context, we also investigate cluster head selection schemes, specifically, we consider two intelligent schemes based on the fuzzy C-means and k-medoids algorithms and a random selection with no intelligence. We show that the use of intelligent schemes greatly improves the performance of the system, but their use entails higher complexity and selection delay. The main performance metrics considered in this work are energy consumption, successful transmission probability and cluster formation latency. As an additional feature of this work, we study the effect of errors in the wireless channel and the impact on the performance of the system under the different transmission probability schemes.