An efficient genetic algorithm for the power-based QoS many-to-one routing problem for wireless sensor networks

Since the operations of sensors in a wireless sensor network mainly rely on battery power, power consumption becomes an important issue. In this paper, we will consider the problem of searching for multiple paths between multiple source sensors and the sink such that any sensor in a path from a source sensor to the sink does not run out of its power during the transmission of packets. The problem has been proved to be NP-complete. Based on the principle of genetic algorithms, in this paper, we will design an efficient heuristic algorithm for it. Computer simulations verify that the suboptimal solutions generated by our genetic algorithm are very close to the optimal ones.