Scheduling Mechanism for Energy-Efficient Communication in Hybrid Wireless Sensor Networks

The paper discusses a topic at the frontier of two domains that are subjects for intensive research in recent years, namely the Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). One of the main issues addressed in WSN is energy consumption and communication has the principal responsibility. Scheduling schemes for alternating active with sleep periods for nodes represents the most effective approach. This work considers the scheduling mechanism when the gateway node of the WSN is performed by an UAV, thus the topology is not fix. Additionally, the authors propose the use of directional antenna for improving the efficiency of the communication. In this way the ground nodes communicate only with the UAV, forming a hybrid WSN. The novelty of the work consists in the proposed architecture together with the communication algorithm that can offer the intended life of several years for a WSN.