Gathering Correlated Data in Wireless Sensor Networks using a Heuristic Algorithm

We propose a routing scheme for data gathering and aggregation in wireless sensor networks. The scheme aims to optimise an aggregation tree in order to minimise the energy dissipation of data aggregation and transmission. A modified particle swarm optimisation algorithm is developed in the proposed scheme. In addition, the routing scheme uses a generic data aggregation model which accommodates different correlation conditions. The performance of the proposed scheme is evaluated and compared with three other existing data gathering algorithms. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme outperforms existing algorithms in terms of energy consumption and that the scheme can adapt to the change of network connectivity and data correlation conditions.