A Two-Level Cluster based Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks have emerged as a promising technology for a wide range of important applications. Energy conservation and prolonging the network lifetime are significant challenges in the design and implementation of wireless sensor networks. Clustering techniques have emerged as a popular choice for prolonging the lifetime of a wireless sensor network. In this paper, we propose a Two-Level Cluster based Protocol (TLCP) for wireless sensor networks to minimize the energy consumption and maximize the lifetime of wireless sensor networks. TLCP organizes sensor nodes into clusters and improves the data transmission mechanism from the cluster heads to the base station via constructing a cluster among the cluster heads. Simulation results show that our proposed protocol has better performance than LEACH and CBRP in terms of network lifetime, stability period, instability period, energy consumption and network throughput.