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Computers and Electrical Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compeleceng

A dynamic Energy-aware fault tolerant routing protocol for

wireless sensor networksR
Khalid Haseeb a,∗, Kamalrulnizam Abu Bakar a, Abdul Hanan Abdullah a,
Adnan Ahmed b, Tasneem Darwish a, Fasee Ullah a
a
Faculty of Computing, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia UTM, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia
b
Quaid-e-Awam University of Engineering, Science & Technology, Nawabshah 67480, Sindh, Pakistan

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In recent decades, cluster-based schemes have emerged as viable solutions for energy con-
Received 25 February 2016 servation problem in wireless sensor networks (WSN). However, most of the existing so-
Revised 25 October 2016
lutions incur imbalanced energy consumption and high network overheads. In addition,
Accepted 26 October 2016
existing cluster-based solutions do not optimize route discovery based on the restricted re-
Available online xxx
sources of sensor nodes. Moreover, most of the cluster-based solutions perform periodical
Keywords: re-clustering for load balancing, which results in shortening network lifetime. This research
Network lifetime paper presents a Dynamic Energy-aware Fault Tolerant Routing (DEFTR) protocol that ex-
Energy-awareness ploits uniform-sized network partitioning based on network size and utilizes a multi-facet
Clusters formation routing mechanism, which takes into consideration the residual energy, and position and
Fault tolerant link quality of neighbors. Furthermore, DEFTR not only offers reliable and energy efficient
Energy de-efficiency data routing but also supports fault tolerance. Simulation results demonstrate that DEFTR
Wireless sensor networks improved the network lifetime by 20.9% and throughput by 35%, also it reduced the delay
by 29% and transmission cost by 46% in comparison to the existing work.
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

WSN comprises of an enormous number of tiny devices called sensor nodes that are spread in a physical environment
for collecting required information. With the integration of information sensing, computation, and wireless communication,
the sensor nodes can sense physical status, process the sensed information, and report them to the sink node or Base Sta-
tion (BS) [1,2]. Due to limited resources, sensor nodes consume their energy rapidly and it is impractical or difficult to
refresh their batteries. Consequently, improving energy conservation is the foremost design challenge for any sensor based
network. In recent decades, the concept of hierarchical based solutions [3,4] has been widely used in the field of wireless
communication for energy efficiency and routing performance. Basically, the concept behind hierarchical schemes is to group
the sensor nodes in non-overlapping regions called clusters and each cluster has one leader node called Cluster Head(CH)
[5]. Although different clustering schemes have been proposed, most of them generate sub-optimal clusters leading to un-
necessary energy consumption and imbalanced load distribution [6,7]. In addition, most of the existing schemes perform
non-optimized route discoveries, which disturb the data forwarding operations and may result in frequent route breakages

R
This paper is for CAEE special section SI-wls7. Reviews processed and recommended for publication to the Editor-in-Chief by Guest Editor Dr. R.
Varatharajan.
∗
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: [email protected] (K. Haseeb).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compeleceng.2016.10.017
0045-7906/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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with re-transmissions. Moreover, the majority of the recent schemes support fault tolerance by performing re-clustering of
the entire network field at periodic intervals, which acquires additional communication overheads and energy resources. In
this paper, a dynamic energy-aware fault tolerant routing protocol is designed to address the limitations of existing energy-
based routing schemes for WSNs. Unlike the majority of existing solutions, our proposed protocol generates uniformly sized
clusters based on network size. By exploiting composite metrics within the bounded regions, appropriate nodes are chosen
to be CHs thereby improving network lifetime. Based on a multi-facet strategy, the optimized routing paths are constructed
at multi-level and a fault tolerant mechanism is developed, which result in reducing route recovery time and balancing
energy consumption. The simulations for evaluating DEFTR protocol are done in Network simulator (NS-2) [8,9]. The simu-
lation results reveal outstanding performance in terms of different evaluation metrics as compared to other state-of-the-art
protocols. The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. Section 2 presents the related work. Section 3 highlights the
findings of related work and contributions of proposed protocol. Section 4 illustrates the preliminaries and energy model.
Section 5 presents the details of our proposed DEFTR protocol. The evaluation and validation of proposed DEFTR protocol
are discussed in Section 6. Finally, Section 7 concludes the paper with some future research directions.

2. Related work

Sensor nodes of WSNs are characterized by constrained resources.During data gathering and forwarding process, the
sensors limited energy has impacts on network lifetime. LEACH [10] is the first dynamic cluster-based routing approach
for WSN, which uses a stochastic process. A random number is generated by each node n then it is elected as a CH if the
random number is smaller than a threshold Tn as shown in Eq. 1, where P is the required fraction of clusters, r is the current
round, G is the set of nodes that have been not selected as CH in last 1/p rounds.
 P
if n ∈ G
Tn = (
1−P∗ r mod P
1
) (1)
0 otherwise
However, random selection of CHs leads to short network lifetime and sub-optimal clusters formation. To improve the
performance of LEACH, different energy efficient schemes are proposed [11,12], where CHs are selected by BS based on the
provided information by nodes. Nevertheless, such solutions have a scalability problem and incur further network over-
heads. The Multi-hop Routing with Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy (MR-LEACH) [13] is presented for balancing
the energy load and improving data delivery performance. MR-LEACH approach divides the sensors field into numerous lay-
ers and each layer is considered as a particular cluster. MR-LEACH initiated the concept of equal clustering, where any node
in a particular layer can reach BS in identical hop count. However, it lacks of optimizing the end-to-end routing paths by
keeping in view the scarce resources of nodes, thereby results in lower network throughput.
Chain-Chain Based Routing Protocol (CCBRP) [14] provides a hybrid scheme that incorporates the characteristics of LEACH
and PEGASIS. CCBRP allocates the nodes into different chains in two different phases, which incurs high energy consump-
tion in the large scaled region. In addition, the selection of intermediate nodes during chain construction is non-optimized
which significantly decreases network lifetime and requires more re-transmissions. Different unequal cluster-based schemes
[8,15,16] are developed to address the issue of a hot spot, which occurs in neighbor clusters closest to BS, as these clusters
need to handle additional traffic load coming from the faraway clusters. In such schemes, unequal clusters are generated
where smaller size clusters are closer to BS. Nevertheless, utilizing different size of clusters leads to uneven distribution of
traffic load among CHs and has scalability problems, as the overall operation is performed in a centralized manner.Recently,
fuzzy based clustering protocols are presented [17,18] for the formation of clusters and electing of CHs over the network
field. As compared to probabilistic approaches, fuzzy based schemes are more energy efficient and reliable. However, such
schemes have slow convergence time and are not feasible for large scale networks.
In Tree Based Clustering (TBC) [19], a logical tree is constructed inside each cluster where the associated CH is elected
as the root node. TBC utilizes distance factor for the determining of nodes level inside each constructed tree. However, TBC
lacks the ability to adapt to changing network conditions such as node’s residual energy and quality of wireless links, which
results in frequently route breakages and compromised network lifetime. An energy efficient fault tolerant clustering routing
protocol [20] was proposed, which aims to execute run time recovery when CHs are unexpectedly fail. In this protocol, a
Distributed Fault tolerant Clustering Routing (DFCR) algorithm is introduced to perform clustering and data routing phases.
To handle the failure of CHs during data routing, DFCR searches an additional suitable CH with minimum hop counts. In
addition, to deal with fault tolerance, this approach only considered permanent failures of CHs and temporary failure of
sensors is overlooked.

3. Contributions of proposed DEFTR protocol

Based on the related work, it is revealed that cluster-based schemes have a great impact on saving energy and have
higher network scalability. However, most of the existing clustering schemes are based on probabilistic or random selection
methods that construct sub-optimal clusters. Moreover, the CH election mechanism incurs over the entire network field,
which leads to degrading network lifetime and significantly increasing network overheads. Furthermore, most of existing
cluster-based routing schemes do not optimize route discovery according to the restricted resources of sensor nodes and
the dynamic nature of wireless communication links. In addition, due to limited and low-powered constraints of sensor

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nodes, most of the existing energy efficient routing schemes are prone to faults because of imbalanced energy consumption.
An exhausted node not only disturbs the data delivery performance but it also affects the network lifetime. It is observed
that to provide fault tolerance mechanism, most of the existing schemes either exploit re-transmissions or replicate the
same message on different routes which results in extra network congestion. Moreover, it is concluded that most of the
existing schemes update the role of CHs among nodes on the periodical basis, for the purpose of enhancing their fault
tolerance level, which leads to unnecessary overheads.
This research paper focuses on developing energy-aware cluster-based fault tolerance routing protocol, which is capable
of generating balanced sized clusters and optimized routes. The proposed protocol is suitable for wide range of important
applications that require energy efficient, reliable and multi-hop communication. Firstly, DEFTR protocol divides the sen-
sor nodes into distinct clusters based on network size, which places near optimal number of nodes in each cluster and
has significant improvement in terms of energy consumption and network lifetime. In addition, the proposed protocol em-
ploys the CH election mechanism inside the clusters boundaries by exploiting multiple weighted metrics. Secondly, DEFTR
exploits composite routing function for the routing decision, which is based on node’s distance, residual energy, and link
quality factors. The composite function determines a limited number of intermediate nodes to take part in route discovery
mechanism, which results in reducing communication overheads. The adopted multi-metric strategy of proposed protocol
at both intra and inter-clusters communication is to establish shortest, more energy efficient and consistent routing paths,
which improves network lifetime. At the end, DEFTR reduces network disruption, which is caused by exhausted or energy
de-efficient nodes over the constructed routing paths. In order to balance the energy consumption over the routing paths,
DEFTR constructs alternative disjoint routes within each cluster boundary, which can be used when the primary route is
broken. Moreover, based on network conditions, DEFTR makes dynamic decisions to replace the exhausted CHs rather than
re-clustering the entire network field at periodic intervals, which improves the end-to-end network connectivity. The quali-
tative analysis of our proposed DEFTR protocol with existing solutions is summarized in Table 1.

4. Preliminaries

This section presents the network assumptions and energy model that are adopted by DEFTR protocol. Sensor nodes are
randomly deployed in two-dimensional network field and the entire network field comprises of homogenous nodes in terms
of resources. After deployment, all nodes remain static and each node knows its location via a positioning algorithm, which
is applied only once after deployment. Nodes can amend their transmission power based on receiver distance and sense
data at a fixed interval. During network setup, BS is considered the most powerful node and does not have any resources
restriction. We considered the energy model that was adopted in [10,20]. Assume that d is a distance between two nodes
i and j. The energy consumption during transmitting and receiving k data bits is shown in Eqs. 2 and 3.

Eelect ∗ k + k ∗ E f s ∗ d2 , i f d ≤ dt
ET r (k, d ) = (2)
Eelect ∗ k + k ∗ Eamp ∗ d4 , i f d > dt

ERx (k ) = Eelect ∗ k (3)

Eelect is per bit energy consumption during sending and receiving . The amplifier’s energy consumption is shown by Efs ∗ d2

or Efs ∗ d4 which is selected on the basis distance from source to destination. Distance threshold is given by dt , if d ≤ dt then
free space model is used where multi-hop fading model is employed.

5. Design of DEFTR protocol

This section presents our DEFTR protocol, whereas the details of its components are discussed in sub sequent sections.The
design of DEFTR protocol constitutes clusters formation, dynamic routes setup and fault tolerability components. Firstly,
clusters formation partitions the entire sensor field into uniformly sized clusters based on network size. In addition, using
compound weighted metrics, the appropriate nodes are chosen as CHs that are optimally fit to be the administrative heads
within the clusters. Secondly, the dynamic routes setup incorporates multi-facet strategy in routing decisions to achieve
shortest, more energy efficient and reliable data forwarding. Finally, the aim of fault tolerance component is to support
robust routing by discovering alternative routes when energy-deficient nodes are encountered on active routing path. More-
over, CHs are focal points within clusters regions; as they are exposed to high energy consumption due to their additional
liabilities and being frequently involvement in routes re-adjustment process. Therefore, the role of CHs is shifted on demand
basis among cluster’s members by exploiting network conditions

5.1. Clusters formation

In DEFTR protocol, the process of clusters formation is executed only once in entire network lifetime. Thus, DEFTR proto-
col reduces network overheads and energy expenses by avoiding frequent re-clustering. Based on nodes density, BS creates
Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA)schedules and requests the nodes to localize themselves. BS broadcasts its ID and
upon receiving a BS discovery packet, each node makes an entry in its routing table. In addition, nodes increment the hop
count field in the packet and further share the BS discovery packet with their neighbors. A node might receive aBS discovery

Please cite this article as: K. Haseeb et al., A dynamic Energy-aware fault tolerant routing protocol for wireless sensor
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Table 1
Qualitative analysis of proposed protocol and existing schemes.

Protocol Method Fault tolerance Link-Quality Hop Counts Trans-mission cost Through-Put Routing Metric Network Lifetime end-to-end delay Robust

LEACH Distributed No No 1-hop Moderate Low Direct Low Moderate Limited

Dynamic/central clustering Centralized No No 1-hop High Low Direct Low Moderate Limited
CCBRP Distributed No No k-hop Moderate Moderate Shortest Moderate High Moderate
MR-LEACH Distributed No No k-hop Moderate Moderate Shortest Moderate Moderate Moderate
Unequal leach Distributed No No 1-hop Moderate Low Direct Low Moderate Limited
UHEED Distributed No No k-hop Moderate Moderate Shortest Moderate Moderate Limited
TRP Distributed No No k-hop High Moderate Energy, distance Moderate High Limited
TBC Distributed No No k-hop Moderate Low Direct Low Moderate Limited
DFCR Distributed 1-level No k-hop Moderate Moderate Shortest Moderate Moderate Moderate
Optimal load distribution Distributed 1-level No k-hop High Moderate Shortest Moderate Moderate Moderate
Proposed Protocol Distributed k-level Yes Multi level Moderate High Optimal Routing High Moderate High

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Fig. 1. Impact of number of nodes on clusters formation.

packet from multiple sources, in this case, source node offering least hop count towards BS are favored and recorded in the
routing table. Eventually, all nodes learn their route towards BS. Afterwards, each node sends its position information via its
upstream node and this step continues till BS has a global knowledge of the entire network field. Then, based on network
size (n), BS divides the entire network field into an optimum number of clusters (p) of square sized partitions by using Eq. 4,
where k is considered as a squared number.

k=n∗ p (4)

In the design of DEFTR protocol, the vital functionality is to find out the optimum number of clusters during a network
partition. If the number of clusters is non-optimized it offset the benefits of clustering mechanism and leads to inefficient
use of energy and computational resources. Fig. 1 illustrates that number of generated clusters is directly proportional to
network size and increases linearly as network size increases from 100 to 500 nodes.
To commence with clusters formation phase, BS exploits the knowledge of geographical positions (xi , yi ) of known nodes
and computes the center point for each partition i. Next, by using node’s position and determined set of centre points, for
each virtual partition BS formulates a cluster of the set of nodes which are relatively closer to its centre point. Further-
more, a unique CLUS_ID is assigned to each generated cluster. Such mechanism is sustained until all nodes are collected
into non-overlapping k clusters. The foremost aim of this mechanism is to distribute roughly identical number of nodes per
cluster and chances of two immediate nodes to be selected as CHs are avoided. Moreover, most of the existing schemes
perform CH election in probabilistic or random manner, which results in the construction of sub-optimal clusters and leads
to unbalanced energy consumption with compromised network lifetime. A CH is an essential point and over burdened with
data traffic, which results in energy hole problems and degrading network performance. The next stage is to initiate the
election mechanism for initial CHs within the bounded regions. A minimum subset of nodes participates for CH election,
which leads to fewer communication overheads and energy consumption. The proposed clustering component performs CH
election mechanism in distributed manner and exploits compound metrics by considering node’s residual energyei , distance
dti and densitydi factors. Based on these factors, each node inside a cluster region computes its weighted value. As a re-
sult, nodes that optimize the weighted metric are considered as candidates for CHs. Firstly, nodes determine their distance
dti towards centroid of clusters by using a Euclidean distance formula. Thus, shorter distance implies that the node is rela-
tively closer to mid-point of cluster and has higher chance to be chosen as a CH. Secondly, nodes continuously track their
energy levels; thus, the nodes with enough energy resource have higher probability to be elected as CHs. Hence, within
each cluster, nodes sustain a local table to keep their neighbors information. Consequently, the node with higher neighbors’
density has higher chances to be declared as CH. After obtaining the local information by each node, the values are summed
in a weighted manner to determine the rank for CH election based on Eq. 5.
1
wi = α ei + β + γ di (5)
dti
α , β , γ are the coefficients denoting the impact of residual energy, distance and node density factors respectively. The
values of all the coefficient are taken in the range of 0 and 1. Also, the coeffiients α , β , γ are assigned in such a way that
α + β + γ = 1. Finally, the optimum nodes in terms of residual energy, distance and density factors are potential contestants
to be appointed as CHs within the cluster regions.Next, elected CHs flood their local clusterswith their status information in
a controlled way by broadcasting an advertisment message. The advertisement message comprises of ID of appointed CH,
its position information and CLUS_ID in which it resides. Member nodes upon receiving the message further forwards it
among their neighbors till all the nodes in the cluster are informed about CH status. The advertisement message is ignored
by nodes if their cluster ID is different. Based on the number of member nodes within each cluster, elected CHs schedule
their TDMA cycle by dividing the transmission time Tinto fixed time slots, which aims to avoid chances of data collision

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Table 2
Routing table of source node.

Residual energy ej Distance to neighbor di, j Link estimator ETTi, j Computed FL

——– ———- ——— ———

in data transmission and utilize resources in a well-organized manner.CH distributes the transmission slots to its cluster
members and each node switch to sleep mode in scheduled manner for saving its energy.

5.2. Dynamic routes setup

To ensure timely and reliable data forwarding among nodes, DEFTR constructs parallel routing chains named as Improved
Cluster-based Route Discovery (i-CBRD) for both intra-cluster and inter-clusters communication. In addition, to balance the
energy consumption over the entire network field, a multi-facet routing function selects an optimized next-hop neighbor
for data forwarding by using residual energy, distance and link quality. The rationale behind this is to only select next-hops
that can provide shortest, more energy efficient and reliable routing paths. Consequently, such dynamic routes adjustment
reduces re-transmissions and balances data traffic loads among nodes, which leads to improving network lifetime and data
delivery performance.
Firstly, the route setup component initiates a neighbor discovery phase among member nodes to determine nearly op-
timal intra-cluster data routing paths. Each node floods route request packet among member nodes. Then, adjacent nodes
respond with their residual energy and distance information to the source node. In this manner, each node constructs a
local table that comprises of collected information of all its adjacent nodes. Moreover, to determine the link quality among
neighbors, each node determines the Estimated Transmission Time (ETT) based on Eq. 6, by exploiting Estimated Transmis-
sion Count (ETX), that is used to measure the quality of route among two adjacent nodes using the size of the packet (S)
and link capacity (B). As a result, each communication link has specified score according to its calculated ETT value. The
specified score is traced in the constructed local table by a source node.
E T Ti = E T Xi ∗ S/B (6)
When a source node tries to determine its next-hop among neighborsNi for data forwarding, it computes the Forwarder
Level (FL) by using the recorded information in its local table. The residual energy, distance and ETT are summed in a
weighted manner to determine the score for FL by using Eq. 7.
 
1 1
F L = α ∗e j + β ∗ +γ∗ , j ∈ Ni (7)
Di j ET Ti j
α , β , γ are the coefficients denoting the impact of residual energy, distance and link qualtity factors. The values of all
the coefficient are taken in the range of [0,1]. Also, the sum of coefficients α , β , γ are assigned in such a way that it must
be equal to 1.Thus, each source node selects anappropriate neighbor with the highest FL as its next-hop by exploiting stored
information in routing table, as illustrated in Table 2. Afterwards, the source node unicasts Route Request (RREQ) message
towards chosen next-hop. The elected next-hop initially confirms whether the destination address is among its neighbors.
In the case of finding a match, selected existing node sets the next-hop flag directly towards the destination. If not, the
current node selects a new suitable next-hop based on computed FL score and propagates RREQ message towards it. This
practice continues till an optimized routing path is constructed towards the corresponding CHs.
Furthermore, to decrease excessive energy consumption among CHs, multi-hop based hierarchical formation for dynamic
routes are adjusted. The steps undertaken during inter-cluster communication are described as follows.
1. On receiving the BS route discovery information, CHs that are the one-hop distance from BS send their ID’s toward BS
with their default transmission power. Consequently, CHs with one-hop distance from BS are capable of direct transmis-
sion towards BS thereby constructing tier-1 of the hierarchical structure.
2. In order to keep on the formation of CHs hierarchical structure, CHs at tier-1 further disseminate the information about
BS and determine their next-hop CHs. Upon reception of BS message from tier-1, next-hop CHs form the tier-2, send their
ID’s towards BS via tier-1 CHs. This same practice is repeated till all undiscovered CHs become a part of the particular
tierof hierarchical structure as shown in Fig. 2
3. It might happen that CHs receive multiple propogated messages with different hop counts, in such case; the minimum
hop-count is elected as an upper tier for data routing. By this manner, multi-hop routes towards BS are constructed that
are utilized for consequent data transmission.
4. On receiving the data packets, if BS is positioned at the next-hop of source CH then aggregated sensory data will be
transmitted directly to BS. Otherwise, CH at a lower tier exploits its upper tier CH for data forwarding. In addition, lower
tier CHs are not allowed to directly data forwarding towards BS.In this manner, every downstream CH consumes less
transmission power while delivering data.
5. It might be a case that there are multiple CHs in the upper tier, candidate CHs is identified by comparing their residual
energy to a certain threshold. Afterwards, the ETT value of candidate CHs is computed, and finally, CH with the lowest
ETT value is elected as next-hop.

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Fig. 2. Linkage of CHs in different tiers.

RREQ Primary route

S Status<threshold

Alternative route
Status< A E
threshold RREQ
RREQ Status< RREQ
threshold
Status<
threshold
C
G H
RREQ
RREQ
discard
RREQ F
B D
I
RREQ
RREQ RREQ

Fig. 3. Paradigm of intra-cluster disjoint route discovery.

5.3. Fault tolerability

Sensor nodes have restricted energy constraints and are extremely prone to faults due to performing numerous functions.
The malfunction of nodes not only influences the data forwarding but also reduces network connectivity and lifetime. In
our DEFTR protocol, the fault tolerability component is carried out in two phases. The first phase initiates a mechanism
to discover an optimized alternative disjoint routing path when encountering low energy nodes on an active route inside
each cluster region. The constructed alternative routing path can be used in case of primary route failure. The second phase
commences a mechanism for balancing load distribution and energy consumption among elected CHs. Thus, the function of
CH is rotated among member nodes by exploiting network conditions.
In the first phase, the source node switches to the alternative routing path upon receiving aroute-error message from any
of its primary route nodes. The route-error message is sent towards the source when the energy status of an intermediate
node drops to predefine threshold. By receiving route-error message, the neighbors towards the source node propagate their
information and update routing tables. In DEFTR, the alternative routing paths towards associated CHs are constructed by
source nodes in advance, based on FL values for their neighbors, by exploiting the aforementioned dynamic routes setup
component. The construction of alternative routes in advance contributes in decreasing route recovery time and data latency.
In order to balance the load distribution among intermediate nodes, DEFTR exploits the saved contents of routing table
and re-evaluates the FL values. Accordingly, based on new FL values, a source node sends RREQ message to its next most
preferred neighbor with different Route ID. Nevertheless, to attain energy efficiency and longer route lifetime, the primary
and alternative routes are constructed as disjoint routes by utilizing different intermediate nodes. To achieve this, each node
can accept only one RREQ message at a time. In the case of receiving another RREQ while being part of the primary route,
the incoming RREQ packet is ignored as shown in Fig. 3, if node H that is part of the primary route, received another route
request via node F then RREQ packet is discarded. However, if RREP message is not received at node F within a certain
time period (t), node F unicasts the RREQ message to the second most preferred neighbor node based on computed FL
value. This procedure is applied repeatedly by intermediary nodes until the route is constructed towards the destination.
After switching to the alternative route, the source node sends a route-update message to the primary route nodes in order
to terminate the primary route. Afterwards, a source node will consider the alternative route as a new primary route and
construct a new alternative route.

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Table 3
Simulation parameters.

Parameter Value

Sensor field 20 0 × 20 0m2

Eelect 50nJ/ bit
Eamp 10nJ/bit/m2
Efs 0.0013pJ/bit/m4
Packet size 512 bits
Control packet size 25 bits
Initial energy of node 5J
Probability of clusters (p) 5%
Simulation time 1500 sec
Round period 20 sec
Node’s transmission range 30m

In the second phase, CHs that are nearer to BS suffer higher traffic load, which consumes their energy sooner as com-
pared to farther CHs. As a result, t is calculated based on Eq. 8, whereas t for CHs nearer to BS has a lower value which
results in rotating CHs more frequently to balance their energy utilization.
t = t ∗ distchi toBS /distmax (8)
wheret is fixed round step, distchi toBS is the distance between CH towards BS and distmax is the distance of the farthest node
from BS.Furthermore, to increase the energy conservation and fault tolerance of inter-cluster routing, CH energy consump-
tion is exploited as a vital metric in CH rotation. However, DEFTR protocol gives higher precedence to CH energy consump-
tion as compared to its distance from BS. When a CH residual energy falls under a certain threshold (i.e. 50% of energy
status when it was elected as CH), a re-election routine begin among its member nodes to choose a new CH. Otherwise,
upon reaching the end of t, the chosen CH alters its next-hop flag to false and quit from data forwarding. However, CH re-
election process is initiated within specified zone in the cluster region. Current CH computes a threshold distance Dthreshold
by exploiting its own distance from the centre of the cluster and floods the region bounded by Dthreshold requesting the
nodes to respond with their residual energy and distance. Nodes that are positioned inside the threshold distance, respond
to CH with their residual energy and distance. In addition, nodes that are located within the Dthreshold further forward the
CH’s request with their neighbors till it is discarded by nodes outside the threshold distance. If current CH does not receive
any response from its member nodes within the predefined time interval (t), it assumes that no qualified nodes are found
within the computed Dthreshold and accordingly gradually increases the Dthreshold to expand the search zone. In the re-election
mechanism, the residual energy of qualified nodes is given high priority as compared to their distance from the centroid of
the cluster. Among candidates, the nodes with residual energy greater than the threshold are identified and then the node
relatively near to centroid is elected as a new CH. Next, the new chosen CH floods its cluster by sending ID and position
information in order to update the transmission schedule and members association. In addition, the new chosen CH informs
adjacent CHs by sending its status information for the function of dynamic inter-cluster routing. Accordingly, DEFTR proto-
col localized the CH rotating mechanism within the cluster region that greatly decreases re-election overheads and improves
network connectivity. The three components of DEFTR protocol are governed by Algorithm 1.

6. Simulation and performance analysis

This section presents the simulation setup and performance evaluation of our proposed DEFTR protocol. To evaluate the
efficacy of DEFTR protocol, a sensitivity analysis is carried out to determine the impact of coefficient factors with different
possible assignments. Then, based on varying number of nodes and packets generation rate, the DEFTR protocol is assessed
against the existence schemes (MR-LEACH, DFCR, and CCBRP). Table 3 illustrates the simulation parameters that are used in
this study and have been exploited by several researchers [21–23] to evaluate the performance of their proposed solutions.
We run the simulation for 1500 sec and time interval for each round is set to 20 sec. The performance of proposed DEFTR
protocol is evaluated in terms of network lifetime and throughput, transmission cost, and average end-to-end delay.

6.1. Sensitivity of coefficient factors

Basically, no optimum values can be given to coefficient factors that would be suitable for all kind of network applica-
tions or scenarios. In order to perform sensitivy analysis of CH election mechanism, three different configurations are made
such that configuration-1 corresponds to α = 0.6, β = 0.2 and γ = 0.2, configuration-2 denotes α = 0.2, β = 0.6, and γ = 0.2,
whereas configuration-3 represents α = 0.2, β = 0.2, and γ = 0.6. Configuration-1, configuration-2, and configuration-3 are
evaluated in terms of average energy level, average distance measurement and neighborhood density as a criterion to de-
termine the optimum values for α , β , γ . Fig. 4 shows that in configuration-1 the most energy efficient nodes are elected
as CHs where higher weight is given to energy factor α . Fig. 5 depicts the configuration-2 effects where the node closest to
the centroid is selected as CH. Fig. 6 describes configuration-3 whereas the node with the highest neighborhood density is
selected as CH.

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Algorithm 1 Dynamic energy-aware fault tolerant routing protocol.

1st Component: Clusters formation

1. Exploiting network size n and required number of clusters to compute network portioning
2. procedureGENERATION OF CLUSTERS(K)
3. for each partition i ∈ [1:K]
4. do
5. Determine central point CP
6. LCP [i] = CP ;
7. end for
8. for each node i ∈ [1:N]
9. do
10. Computedistance(i x,y , LCP )& joins to
11. nearest centroid
12. end for
13. for each member_nodei,j ∈ [1: clusterj_members ]
14. do
15. wi = α ei + β ( d1t ) + γ di
i
16. end for
17. end procedure
2nd Component: Dynamic Route Setup
1. procedure Intra-clusters routes discovery
2. for each node m ∈ [1:M]
3. do
mdeterminesFL of adjacent nodes
4. end for
5. while (y!= destination)
yselectsRREQ to adjacent node with highest FL
6. end while
7. end procedure
8. procedure Inter-clusters routes discovery
9. for each node i on receiving information of BS
10. do
11. If (Id = = identity of CH) &&next-hop = = BS)
12. store the BS information &forward response
13. else if (Id = = CH id) &&next-hop != BS_ID)
14. nodestore BS information ID& electedas C Hupper_tier
15. else if (node Id! = CH id)
16. ignore information of BS
17. end if
18. end procedure
3rd Component: Fault Tolerance
1. procedure Intra-Cluster fault tolerance routing
2. Ralternative = Intra-Cluster alternative routes construction ()
3. if (m Rp and mres < threshold)
4. Send route_err message to ms
5. ms switch to Ralternative
6. end if
7. procedure Intra-Cluster alternative routes construction
8. if (the primary route is discovered)
9. y= ms
10. while (y!= destination)
11. yselects np which has secondmaximum FS value
12. ycreates RREQ and send to np
13. ifnp is part of active RouteID then
14. discard RREQ
15. Repeat step no. 11&12
16. else
17. np Reply to y
18. y = np
19. end if
20. end procedure
21. procedure Inter-clusters fault tolerance
22. if (Chi . energy < threshold)
23. shift the position of (Chi ) with appropriate node
24. else
25. t= t ∗ distchi toBS /distmax
26. shift the position of (Chi ) with appropriate node
27. end if
28. end procedure

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2
Configuration-1
1.9 Configuration-2
Configuration-3
1.8
Average energy level (j)
1.7

1.6

1.5

1.4

1.3

1.2
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Number of cluster Heads

Fig. 4. Average energy v/s cluster heads.

40

35
Average distance measurement

30

25

20

15

Configuration-1
10
Configuration-2
Configuration-3
5
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Number of cluster Heads

Fig. 5. Average distance measurement v/s cluster heads.

Consequently, to expose more balanced contribution and optimize the CH election mechanism, the coefficient factors are
set to uniform values (α = β = γ = 0.33, where as α + β + γ = 1). In addition, this section presents the analysis of different
coefficient factors that are incorporated in routing decisions. In order to perform the sensitivity analysis, three different
configurations are made such that i-CBRD-1 corresponds to α = 0.5, β = 0.3 and γ = 0.2, i-CBRD-2 denotes α = 0.2, β = 0.5
and γ = 0.3, whereas i-CBRD-3 represents α = 0.3, β = 0.2 and γ = 0.5. i-CBRD-1, i-CBRD-2 and i-CBRD-3 are evaluated in
terms of network lifetime, delivery latency and message delivery ratio to determine the optimum values for α , β , γ . Fig. 7

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11
Configuration-1
10
Configuration-2
9 Configuration-3

Average neighborhood density

8

0
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Number of cluster Heads

Fig. 6. Average neighborhood density v/s cluster heads.

500
i-CBRD-1
450 i-CBRD-2
i-CBRD-3
400
Netwowk lifetime (sec)

350

300

250

200

150

100
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 7. Network lifetime v/s number of nodes.

shows that i-CBRD-1 acheives better network lifetime as high weight is assigned to the energy factor α . Fig. 8 depicts the
delivery latency results, where i-CBRD-2 has the best performance due to assigning high weights to the distance factor β .
Fig. 9 describes i-CBRD-3, whereas the nodes with highest link quality factor γ are selected as data forwarders.
In this research paper, we considered the nodes as faulty or exhausted due to depletion of their energy resources. The
optimum selection of intermediate nodes in proposed protocol not only improves data delivery performance in an energy
efficient manner but on the other hand, also increases fault tolerability level. To estimate the impact of co-efficient factorsα ,
β , γ in faulty scenarios, i-CBRD-1, i-CBRD-2 and i-CBRD-3 are evaluated in terms of route lifetime, a number of route
discoveries and transmission energy consumption. Fig. 10 shows that i-CBRD-1 acheives better performance in term of route
lifetime, beacuse high weight is assigned to energy factor α , which results in electing only the most energy efficient nodes
as data forwarders thereby improving route lifetime. Fig. 11 depicts the results for consumed transmission energy during
data forwarding, where i-CBRD-2 demonstrates better performance than i-CBRD-1 and i-CBRD-3 due to assigning ahigh

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260

240

220

200
Data latency (sec)
180

160

140 i-CBRD-1
i-CBRD-2
120 i-CBRD-3
100

80

60

20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 8. Delivery latency v/s number of nodes.

100
i-CBRD-1
90 i-CBRD-2
i-CBRD-3

80
Message delivery ratio (%)

70

60

50

40

30
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 9. Message delivery ratio v/s number of nodes.

weight to distance factor β . The significance of incorporating distance factor during routing decision is to elect the least
number of data forwarder, which results in shortening the routing path. Fig. 12 presents the result of routes discovery
upon encountering exhausted nodes. i-CBRD-3 illustrates betterperformance than i-CBRD-2 and i-CBRD-1 whereas the nodes
with highest link quality factor γ are selected as data forwarders. The integration of link quality factor in routing decision
significantly improves data reliability in the faulty scenario and decreases the number of re-transmissions.

6.2. Results analysis under varying network sizes

Fig. 13 depicts that our DEFTR protocol exceeds the existing schemes by 9.5%, 13%, and 20.9% respectively in terms of
network lifetime. This is due to DEFTR protocol generates clusters on the basis of network size and initiates the CH selection

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100
i-CBRD-1
90 i-CBRD-2
i-CBRD-3
80
Route lifetime(sec)
70

60

50

40

30

20
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 10. Route lifetime v/s number of nodes.

0.22
Average transmission energy consumption(j)

0.2

0.18

0.16

0.14

0.12 i-CBRD-1
i-CBRD-2
i-CBRD-3
0.1
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 11. Energy consumption v/s number of nodes.

process inside the bounded regions thereby gradually decreases energy consumption. In addition, DEFTR protocol shifts the
role of CHs by exploiting network conditions. It is observed in Fig. 14 that throughput produced by DEFTR protocol is 15.7%,
24.5%, and 35% respectively higher than existing schemes. Existing routing schemes construct the shortest path for data
forwarding by using least number of hops. Consequently, highly reduce the achievable network throughput due to low
flexibility against node failure, which results in lower overall network performance. Fig. 15 illustrates that DEFTR protocol
achieved lower end-to-end delay by 14%, 22.5%, and 29% respectively than existing schemes. The existing solutions exhibit
a higher end-to-end delay in data forwarding process because of constructing routing path without considering link quality,
which results in a higher route failure probability. Transmission cost is measured over the constructed routing path based

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45

40

Number of route discovery packets

35

30

25

20

15
i-CBRD-1
10 i-CBRD-2
i-CBRD-3
5
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Number of nodes

Fig. 12. Route discoveriesv/s number of nodes.

1000

DEFTR
950 MR-LEACH
DFCR
CCBRP
900
Network lifetime(sec)

850

800

750

700

650
100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Number of nodes

Fig. 13. Impact of number of nodes on network lifetime.

on Eq. 9, while transmitting the data packets between two consecutive nodes.
K=n
k=1 ( E ik − E f k )
Ea = (9)
n
Ei denotes node’s initial energy, Ej is node’s residual energy status and n is the number of nodes that are distributed
over the network field. It is seen in Fig. 16 that DEFTR protocol reduced the transmission cost by 17.8%, 35.8%, and 46% than
existing schemes. In particular, DEFTR protocol transmits data by utilizing energy efficient multi-hop routes, which provides
load balancing and reducing communication distance among routes.

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networks✰, Computers and Electrical Engineering (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compeleceng.2016.10.017
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90

85 DEFTR
MR-LEACH
80 DFCR
CCBRP
Network throughout(kbits/sec) 75

70

65

60

55

50

45

40
100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Number of nodes

Fig. 14. Impact of number of nodes on network throughput.

0.045

0.04
Average end-to-end delay(ms)

0.035

0.03

0.025

0.02 DEFTR
MR-LEACH
DFCR
0.015 CCBRP

100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500

Number of nodes

Fig. 15. Impact of number of nodes on end-to-end delay.

6.3. Result analysis under varying packets generation rate

Obviously, using higher packet generation rate increases network traffic load, which results in reducing network lifetime.
However, as illustrated in Fig. 17, DEFTR protocol improved network lifetime by 11.2%, 18.6%, and 27.1% as compared to
existing schemes. This is due to the generation of different clusters based on network size rather than the probabilistic
method, and the utilization of composite routing function optimized next-hop selection for propagating sensory information.
In addition, it is seen in Fig. 18 that DEFTR improved network throughout by 14%, 22.2%, and 32.6% as compared to existing
schemes. This is due to the construction of parallel routing paths and incorporatration of fault tolerability at multi-level,
which decreases network disruption and improved network throughput. In Fig. 19, DEFTR decreases the end-to-end delay

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0.5

0.45

0.4

0.35
Transmission cost(j)
0.3

0.25

0.2

0.15
DEFTR
0.1 MR-LEACH
DFCR
0.05 CCBRP

0
100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Number of nodes

Fig. 16. Impact of number of nodes on transmission cost.

1150

1100 DEFTR
MR-LEACH
1050 DFCR
CCBRP
1000

950
Network lifetime

900

850

800

750

700

650

600
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Data packets per second

Fig. 17. Impact varying generation of packets on network lifetime.

rate by 18.5%, 29.7%, and 37%, respectively. This is because of the construction of more reliable routes in terms of energy level
and link quality and the construction of alternative routing paths in advance, which reduces the number of re-transmissions
and route breakages. It is observed in Fig. 20 that DEFTR protocol reduces the transmission cost during routing by 27%,
33%, and 38.8% as compared to existing schemes. In particular, DEFTR reduces the communication distance between two
consecutive nodes, which reduces the required transmission power and energy.

7. Conclusion

This paper has presented a Dynamic Energy-aware and Fault Tolerant Routing protocol called DEFTR for WSNs, which
aims to improve network lifetime and routing performance. DEFTR partitioned the entire network field into balance-sized

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90

85 DEFTR
MR-LEACH
80 DFCR
CCBRP
Network throughput(kbits/sec) 75

70

65

60

55

50

45

40
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Data packets per second

Fig. 18. Impact of varying generation of packets network throughput.

0.04
A verage end-to-end delay(ms)

0.035

0.03

0.025

0.02
DEFTR
MR-LEACH
0.015 DFCR
CCBRP

0.01
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Data packets per second

Fig. 19. Impact of varying generation of packets on network delay.

clusters based on network size with minimum energy consumption. In addition, using compound metrics, DEFTR performs
localized CHs election mechanism to reduce computational overheads and initiates re-election mechanism on demand basis.
By exploiting multi-facet attributes in routing decision, our proposed DEFTR protocol offers a more energy efficient and
cost effective solution to deliver data in a reliable way while considering WSN constraints. The proposed protocol is highly
tolerant to route instability and excessive network load scenarios. Moreover, providing fault tolerance support for both intra-
cluster and inter-clusters communication significantly improved data network connectivity and decreased data disruption.
The simulation results reveal improved performance of DEFTR protocol compared to relevant energy efficient clustering
solutions. Our DEFTR protocol presents a lightweight solution for resource constraint WSNs. However, its efficiency on real
hardware platform needs to be studied. For future work, a test-bed is going to be developed for more real evaluation of the

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0.28

0.26

0.24
Transmission cost (j)
0.22

0.2

0.18

0.16
DEFTR
0.14 MR-LEACH
DFCR
0.12 CCBRP

0.1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Data packets per second

Fig. 20. Impact of varying generation of packets on transmission cost.

DEFTR protocol. In addition, the proposed protocol can be further improved by exploiting mobility issues of sensor nodes
during construction and maintenance of routing paths.

Acknowledgement

We gratefully acknowledge the technical support and research facilities provided by the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
(UTM), without which this work could not have been completed.

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Khalid Haseeb received his MS-IT degree from Institute of Management Sciences, Pakistan. He did his Ph.D in Computer Science from Faculty of Computing
at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), in 2016. Since 2008, he is engaged as a Lecturer in Department of Computer Science, Islamia College Peshawar,
Pakistan. His research areas include network security, cloud computing, ad-hoc and wireless sensor networks.

Kamalrulnizam Abu Bakar is a Professor and Deputy Dean (Development & Innovation) in Faculty of Computing at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. He
did his PhD in Computer Science from Aston University, United Kingdom, in 2004. He involves in several research projects and is the reviewer for many
scientific journals. His specialization includes mobile computing, information security, ad-hoc and wireless sensor networks.

Abdul Hanan Abdullah is a Professor in Computer Science at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. He did his PhD degree from Aston University in Birmingham in
1995. He is involved in several research projects and is the referee for many scientific journals and conferences. His specialization includes grid computing,
wireless sensor networks, ad hoc and sensor networks.

Adnan Ahmed is an Assistant Professor in the department of Computer Systems Engineering at Quaid-e-Awam University of Engineering, Science and
Technology, Nawabshah, Pakistan. He completed his PhD in Computer Science from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) in November 2015. His research
interest includes ad hoc networks, security and trust management, quality of service and routing issues in wireless body area network.

Tasneem Darwish is a Ph.D. student at the Faculty of Computing, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. She is a member of the Pervasive Computing research
group. She received her M.Sc. degree in electronics and electrical engineering from the University of Glasgow, United Kingdom, in 2007. Her current
research focuses on vehicular communications, wireless ad hoc networks, and mobile computing.

Fasee Ullah graduated from Department of Computer Science, Islamia College Peshawar, Pakistan in March 2007. He has done MS in Computer Networks
and Information Technology from SZABIST, Islamabad, Pakistan in 2009. Currently, he is pursuing his PhD at Faculty of Computing, Universiti Teknologi
Malaysia (UTM), Malaysia. His research areas include Wireless Body Area Network, sensor and ad-hoc networks and nanotechnology.

Please cite this article as: K. Haseeb et al., A dynamic Energy-aware fault tolerant routing protocol for wireless sensor
networks✰, Computers and Electrical Engineering (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compeleceng.2016.10.017