RaCH: A New Radial Cluster Head Selection Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks

This paper presents a radial cluster heads selection mechanism for homogenous wireless sensor networks. It aims to ensure a good load balancing and enhance the network lifetime. A performance comparison between LEACH, Mod_LEACH, Multi-Chain-PEGASIS, M-GEAR protocols and our proposal in term of network lifetime, stability/instability periods and the evolution of the number of cluster heads is carried out in this work. Obtained results show that developing an efficient cluster heads selection algorithm enhances considerably the network lifetime and the QoS in the network. Simulations results under NS3 simulator showed that our proposal can extend the network life more than 300% compared to the famous LEACH protocol and ensure a network lifetime of about 5000 rounds while it does not exceed 2500 rounds using M-GEAR.