See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/334783581

Application Specific Energy Aware and Reliable Routing Protocol for Wireless
Sensor Network

Conference Paper · June 2019

DOI: 10.1109/ICSCC.2019.8843687

CITATIONS READS
0 59

4 authors, including:

Md Rashedur Rahman Md. Motaharul Islam, PhD

Islamic University of Technology BRAC University
2 PUBLICATIONS   0 CITATIONS    30 PUBLICATIONS   280 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Enam Ahmed Shahaz

Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology
1 PUBLICATION   0 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Winet special issues View project

Application Specific Energy-aware and Reliable Routing Protocol for Health-care Application View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Md Rashedur Rahman on 31 July 2019.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Application Specific Energy Aware and Reliable
Routing Protocol for Wireless Sensor Network
Md Rashedur Rahman Md. Motaharul Islam
Information Technology (IT) Computer Science and
Impress Capital Limited Engineering
Dhaka, Bangladesh BRAC University
bishad19@iut-dhaka.edu Dhaka, Bangladesh
motaharul.islam@bracu.ac.bd
Abstract— Wireless sensor network has brought a new era in
wireless networking platform. Its intense usage in different
application areas has led the researcher to design a new network
architecture paradigm. Due to its uniqueness, traditional wireless
ad hoc network does not suit well in this scenario. Many new
protocols, networking architectures etc. are being proposed.
Wireless sensor network architectures differ from application to
application. Different application demands different mechanism.
Recent advances in wireless sensor networks have led to many new
protocols specifically designed for sensor networks where energy
awareness is an essential consideration. But for healthcare
application only energy awareness cannot achieve the eventual
goal of the sensor network. For that purpose, the reliability of links
plays a vital role. Many protocols like RPL, CTP etc. are proposed
in this context. In this paper, we have proposed an application
specific routing protocol for the healthcare application. Our
proposed routing protocol is devoted to improve the throughput
of data packet transmission in healthcare application maintaining
a sound network life time.
Keywords— Wireless Sensor Network, Application specific
routing protocol, Residual Energy, ETX.
I. INTRODUCTION
A wireless sensor network (WSN) is a wireless network
consisting of spatially distributed autonomous devices called
sensors to monitor physical or environmental conditions [1].
Wireless sensor network, deployed in almost every application
sector, is having uniqueness from one another. This concept has
led the idea of application specific routing protocol. Some
developers like [2] has proposed these types of protocols for
WSN which define the network architecture, routing protocols,
routing metric selection etc. of a specific application scenario.
Many routing protocols are also proposed in this context [3].
A routing protocol for wireless sensor network can be defined
as the defined rules followed by sensor nodes to determine the
paths into which they should forward data towards their
intended destinations [3]. Healthcare application, comprised of
small, low-powered wireless sensor nodes in the body of
patients, requires a unique routing protocol so that the nodes
can transmit all the necessary data reliably and efficiently.[4]
The energy level is also to be considered so that the network
does have remarkable amount of life time.
In this paper, we proposed an Application Specific Routing
Protocol for Healthcare Application or in short ASRPH. The
978-1-7281-1557-3/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE 2019 7th International Conference on Smart Computing & Communications
Enam Ahmed Shahaz Yazed Alsaawy
Information Technology (IT) Computer Science and
Northern Electricity Supply Information Systems
Company Limited (NESCO) Islamic University of Madinah
Rajshahi, Bangladesh Medina, Saudi Arabia
enamahmedshahaz@gmail.com yalsaawy@iu.edu.sa
primary focus we have given on this paper is providing
maximum throughput of data and reliability of the data as well
as the maximum lifetime of the network. For this purpose, in
considering routing metrics for calculating routing path we
consider expected transmission count (ETX) along with
residual energy. ETX helps to minimize the number of packet
delivery in a wireless network [5]. We also proposed a definite
architecture for the healthcare application. Many routing
protocols like RPL [6] [7], CTP [8], TEEN [9] etc. are discussed
in this application context.
In the section 2, we have discussed related works. In section 3,
our proposed architecture has been shown. In section 4 and
section 5, the routing protocol and routing metrics are defined
respectively. In section 6, we have shown our routing
algorithm. In the section 7 and section 8, we have provided the
theoritical evaluation and performance evaluation between our
proposed routing protocol ASRPH and other significant routing
protocol like RPL and CTP. In section 9, we have concluded
our discussion.
II. RELATED WORKS
Routing protocol is a set of rules used by the routers (in WSN
nodes) to determine the most appropriate path which can be
used to send the data packet to its destination [10]. WSN uses
broadcast paradigm to send a data packet and have less
computational power [11]. Many routing protocols are
proposed in this context. In the early stages, gossiping and
flooding [12], SPIN [13], LEACH [14] etc. were proposed
considering the overall WSN scenario, not based on the
application demand.
To ensure the reliability, robustness and efficiency in selecting
the routing path Connection Tree Protocol (CTP) [8] is
proposed. Unlike other routing protocol, this protocol focuses
more on the path reliability than the energy constraints using
Expected Transmission Count (ETX) as a routing metric to
select the routing path. ETX is defined as the expected number
of transmissions to send a data packet [5]. CTP decreases the
number of transmissions in a WSN network by avoiding the less
reliable routes. But in some application field where reliability
is not necessary, CTP cannot be used in those cases.
One of the most popular protocol that is prevalent now is
Routing Protocol for Low-power and Lossy Network (RPL)
[6,7] proposed by Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
ROLL. It is a distance vector routing protocol [6]. The primary
focus of this protocol was to eliminate creation of loop inside
the network. This protocol is good enough for point to
multipoint (P2MP) and multipoint to point (MP2P)
communication but was not good enough to support point to
point traffic well [15]. RPL has a mechanism to adapt to any
kind of application using appropriate routing metrics for that
application.
Today wireless sensor network is to be designed for mobile
bodies that are always changing its location. So, routing
protocol designed for static nodes will not work in these
contexts. [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] have proposed on the
architecture, addressing schemes and routing protocol for the
mobile sensor nodes. In [18] author has proposed a routing
protocol which is energy efficient and having multi-layer
routing scheme. But in Healthcare Application only energy
efficiency does not fulfill the demand of the system. We have
to consider the reliability of data and make sure that all the data
reaches the destination.
III. PROPOSED ARCHITECTURE
6LoWPAN, IPv6 over Low power Wireless Personal Area
Networks, is rapidly gaining popularity for its extensive
applicability, ranging from healthcare to environmental
monitoring. In order to provide more reliable and effective IPv6
connectivity on top of LoWPAN, the 6LoWPAN WG
(Working Group) has defined some key technologies [21]. In
general, 6LoWPAN supports the use of biomedical sensors and
are characterized by its very low transmit power to coexist with
other medical equipment and provide efficient energy
consumption, high data rate to allow applications with high
QoS constraints, low cost, low complexity and miniature size
to allow real feasibility. [11] [22] [23]
Our proposed architecture divides the overall healthcare system
into two tiers. In the system proposed in [4], they divided this
architecture in three tiers. But in our architecture, we are using
6LowPAN technology in human body which is delimitating the
redundancy of using extra layer. Our proposed first tier involves
the user or patient and second tier involves Global network
between the user and the Hospital. Fig. 1 shows the overall
architecture of our system.
A. First Tier
The first tier of the architecture resides in the body area of the
user/patient’s side. The sensor nodes are deployed in the body
of the person in different areas. A group of five to six sensor
node creates a specific network area. One of the nodes among
them works as a border node. The functionality of border node
is to determine the internal routing of the area and send the
received data to the outside smart devices like Android phone.
From the Figure 1, we can see the patient is having three sensor
node areas in his body. The process how several nodes creates
this group will be discussed in the next section.
B. Second Tier
The second tier indicates the global connectivity of the hospital
and the patient. The smart phone or smart devices in the patient
side will store the health condition data in the cloud storage.
The hospital and the doctors can monitor the data of the patient
from the cloud storage. In case of any emergency a triggered
message would be sent from the first tier towards the second
tier which would lead the immediate steps to be taken by the
medical personnel.
Fig.1 Proposed Architecture
IV. ROUTING PROTOCOL
Routing has been considered as one of the key issues in
6LoWPAN networks that should be considered for with Most
of the attention and might differ depending on the application
and network architecture [22] [24]. A routing protocol specifies
how routers communicate with each other, disseminating
information that enables them to select routes between any two
nodes on a computer network. To support effective
communications, the design of a routing protocol must be based
on the characteristics of its target network and applications. For
example, the mobility of nodes in ad-hoc networks demands
routing protocols that can converge rapidly and maintain
connectivity in an efficient manner, the severe energy
constraints of WSNs demand the design of energy-efficient
routing protocols and heavy traffic load in mesh networks
requires load-balancing routing schemes.
In the routing protocol we have proposed, the body has been
divided into several areas. The sensor node will be deployed in
all areas. This division of area can be occurred in two ways.
One can be functionality wise and another is body part wise. In
case of functional division, all the sensor nodes having the
similar kind of functionality will be part of the same network
area. In case of body part wise division, the nodes will be
divided into areas based on their place of the body.
Every area will have a border node as shown in Fig. 2. The sole
responsibility of the border node is to send the data packet to
the master node (smart-phone). But if a single node is assigned
as a master node for all the time it would deplete its energy at a
great level which may cause to the failure in very early time.
So, the border node will not be selected statically. Rather at a
period of time the border node will be changed.
Fig.2 Routing Architecture of ASRPH
V. ROUTING METRICS
To meet the application’s requirements while respecting the
characteristics and limitations of the WSN, appropriate routing
metrics have to be adopted by the routing protocol [23]. We are
using composite routing metrics. Primary routing metric is
remaining energy (RE) and Secondary routing metric is
Expected Transmission Count (ETX). To achieve energy-
awared routing, the routing decisions depend on considerations
of the available energy of the nodes. If the initial energy level
of any node i is and the current energy level is then value of
𝑅. 𝐸 𝑖 will be:[23]
𝑉𝑚𝑎𝑥 𝑖
𝑅𝐸 𝑖 = 𝑖 ≥1 (1)
𝑉 𝑛𝑜𝑤
ETX or Expected Transmission Count (ETX) detects the
reliability of the link. The ETX of a link is the predicted number
of data transmissions required to send a packet over that link,
including retransmissions. The ETX of a link is calculated using
the forward and reverse delivery ratios of the link. At the very
first-time probe packets will be sent throughout the network to
determine the path loss ratio. Forward path ratio can be
calculated by dividing the no. of packet sent and the no. of
acknowledgement found. In the similar manner we can
determine the reverse forward ratio of the same link. If for any
node i it sends packet to node j the forward path ratio is 𝑑𝑓 and
the reverse forward ratio is 𝑑𝑟 . Then we can say [5]
1 4.
𝐸𝑇𝑋 = (2)
𝑑𝑓 × 𝑑𝑟
The delivery ratio can be determined using the following
formula [5]
𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡(𝑡 − 𝜔, 𝑡)
𝑟(𝑡) = 𝜔 (3)
𝑡
𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡(𝑡 − 𝜔, 𝑡) is the number of probes received during the
window 𝜔, and 𝜔⁄𝑡 is the number of probes that should have
been received. In the case of the link i→ j, this technique allows
X to measure𝑑𝑟 , and Y to measure𝑑𝑓 .
As we are combining these two-routing metrics, the weight of
them should be taken into important account. Here we are
considering two different routing metrics having completely
different unit to calculate. That is why we need to unify this two
metrics into a single unit value which will be done in the
following way:
𝑅. 𝐸 ′ = 𝑅. 𝐸 −1 (4)
𝐸𝑇𝑋 ′ = (𝐸𝑇𝑋)−1 (5)
In our proposed protocol this value can be static or dynamic.
For static, the value of the weights will remain same all the
time. But in dynamic case this value will vary according to the
type of the message. For any path from node X to Y [23].
𝑤(𝑎) = 𝑤1 . 𝑅𝐸 ′ +   𝑤2 . 𝐸𝑇𝑋 ′ (6)
w(a) is the weight of the path and w1 , w2 are two constants
which determine the weight of the metrics used in this scenario.
Value of the weight can be dynamic or static. In dynamic case
this value will be determined based on the importance of the
message. In static case, this value will be provided at the early
stage of the setup phase.
VI. ROUTING ALGORITHM
Set of step by step operations that is used to direct and manage
data traffic efficiently, can be defined as routing algorithm. [25]
In Setup phase of ASRPH, every node in the networking area
gets connected to each other and create the routing table for the
specific network area and determines border node is
determined. At first every node will generate a random number
between 1 to 100 to determine the time it would take to send its
first packet and its time slot to send its next packets. The border
node will be the node that will generate the lowest value at first
time. This step will occur for two times because there is a
chance for avoiding collision. Every node will then send probe
packet to every other node in the networking area and get the
acknowledgement packet to determine the ETX of the specific
path. The probe packet will also contain the energy level of the
specific node and the routing table of that specific node which
will help the sending node to determine the best path for
sending data packet. Algorithm 1 defines the process of setup
phase in brief.
1. //initialize weight parameters w1, w2
2. check (w1+w2=1)
3. Generate random number (min: 0, max: 100)
for node u in nodes in Network area {
5. u = Sending node
6. v = Receiving node
7. Send Probe Packet ()
8. Receive acknowledgement packet () TABLE I. THEORITICAL EVALUATION
9. Forward packet ratio= Check forward packet Routing Protocols
ratio (u, v) Factors
ASRPH RPL CTP
10. Receive probe packet () Energy efficient
11. Send acknowledgment packet () and reliable Reliable routing
Routing protocol for
12. Backward packet ratio = Get backward packet Target routing protocol protocol for
all application.
ratio (u, v) for healthcare WSN.
13. ETX (u, v) = 1/ (Forward packet ratio * Backward application.
packet ratio) Application
Yes No No
specific
14. Voltage max(u)=
Composite
check_initial_energy_level () Routing Based on
(Residual Energy ETX
15. Voltage now (u)=Check current energy level () metrics application demand
and ETX)
16. Residual Energy(u)= Voltage max / Voltage now By means of
Can ensure as the
17. // w (u, v) is the path weight of u and v ETX, CTP
node status is Can ensure based on
18. w (u, v) =Determine the weight of the path Reliability ensures the
always known to application demand
19. Store w (u, v) to the routing table reliability of a
the border node
20. Send routing table(v)} path
Architectur
Algorithm 1: Setup Phase Provided Not provided Not provided
al Diagram

After the finishing of setup phase, the nodes will perceive the
data, the current energy level and send it to the border node
along with routing table. From the starting of the data transfer
phase, the border node will generate a random number to
determine the number of iterations for it to be assigned as the
border node. One iteration consists of the time slot in which
every node sends the data packet to the border node for once.
After every iteration the border node will check its current
energy level to determine whether it is still eligible to become
the border node or not. When the border node will find out that
it has ended its tenure it will send a shifting packet to every
node in the area. The border node also hand-over the node status
database to the new border node as well. As in this step the
border node shifts its duty to another node, this packet is called
shifting packet. From Algorithm 2, we can have the illustration
of this phase in brief.
VIII. PERFORMANCE EVALUATION
Now we are going to discuss about evaluation of our routing
protocol, Application Specific Routing Protocol for healthcare
Application or ASRPH. We will evaluate our routing protocol
based on three parameters. They are reliability, high throughput
and network lifetime.
For a healthcare application, every data has considerable
amount of significance. Any data failing to reach the intended
receiver can create a lot of damage to the individual and even
the healthcare system. We conducted our simulation to
calculate how ASRPH works in comparison to the RPL and
CTP. We found that, ASRPH provides 1.29% more throughput
than CTP and 3.96% more than that of RPL which is shown in
Fig. 5.

1. Number of iterations = Generate random

number ()
2. for Number of iterations
3. Receive packets from all nodes ()
4. Send data to mobile device ()
5. Check current energy level ()
6. Store node information ()
7. Border node eligibility = Check border
node eligibility ()
8. if (Border Node Eligibility == false)
break
9.
10. Next border node = Determine next border
node ()
11. Broadcast shifting packet ()
12. Send node information (next border node) Fig. 5 Comparison of Throughput between ASRPH, CTP and RPL
Algorithm 2: Border node in Data Transmission phase In healthcare application, the network lifetime is also very
VII. THEORETICAL EVALUATION important. ASRPH has also provided considerable amount of
focus in this sector as well. During setup phase ASRPH might
Table 1 describes the theoretical evaluation of the proposed be less energy efficient. But after the setup phase, this issue is
routing protocol and others. resolved. Not only considering energy level as routing metric,
but also ETX helps to make the network more energy reliable.
ETX helps to avoid the non-energy reliable path which can
enhance the network lifetime a lot [5]. That is why in
comparison to other routing protocol like RPL and CTP,
ASRPH provides the network better lifetime in Fig. 6.
Fig. 6 Lifetime Comparison
IX. CONCLUSIONS
WSN technology can create a new era in the modern healthcare
application. The patient can be monitored from any locations
by the medical professionals. Any emergency can be estimated
before the event occurred, and necessary steps would be taken
to prevent the scenario. If deployed in every person, it would
help to detect many fatal diseases in early stages which would
help the medical professionals to take early measures. Our
proposed routing protocol can enhance the performance of the
healthcare application in great proportion. As for future work,
we would like to implement the packet format and try to
improve our routing protocol more so that it can provide better
performance in healthcare application.
REFERENCES
[1] http://www.ni.com/white-paper/7142/en/ PhD. Emilian Necula. Faculty
“Dynamic traffic flow prediction based on GPS Data”- 2014 IEEE 26th
International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence
[2] HEINZELMAN et al.: “AN APPLICATION-SPECIFIC PROTOCOL
ARCHITECTURE FOR WIRELESS MICROSENSOR NETWORKS
Yaqin Wang and Yue Chen”, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON WIRELESS
COMMUNICATIONS, VOL. 1, NO. 4, OCTOBER 2002
[3] Arati Manjeshwar and Dharma P. Agrawal, “TEEN: A Routing Protocol
for Enhanced Efficiency in Wireless Sensor Networks”, 0-7695-0990-
8/01/$10.00 (C) 2001 IEEE
[4] Jamila Ben Sliman, Ye- Qiong Song, Anis Koubˆaa, Mounir Frikha. A
Three-Tiered Architecture for Large-Scale Wireless Hospital Sensor
Networks. Workshop MobiHealthInf 2009 in conjunction with BIOSTEC
2009, Jan 2009, Porto, Portugal. pp.64. <inria-00435508 >Centre of
Regional Science Vienna University of Technology. Smart cities. ranking
of european medium-sized cities
[5] Douglas S. J. De Couto, Daniel Aguayo, John Bicket, Robert Morris,
“Wireless Networks - Special issue: Selected papers from ACM
MobiCom 2003 archive Volume 11 Issue 4, July 2005 Pages 419-434”
[6] Tsvetko Tsvetkov, “RPL: IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low Power and
Lossy Networks” Seminar SN SS2011, Network Architectures and
Services, July 2011
View publication stats
[7] T. Winter, Ed et. al, “RPL: IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low-Power and
Lossy Networks” - Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), Request for
Comments: 6550, Category: Standards Track, ISSN: 2070-1721
[8] Rodrigo Fonseca, Omprakash Gnawali, Kyle Jamieson, Sukun Kim,
Philip Levis, and Alec Woo, “The Collection Tree Protocol (CTP)”.
TinyOS Developer List <tinyos-devel at 2009-01-16
[9] Arati Manjeshwar and Dharma P. Agrawal, “TEEN: A Routing Protocol
for Enhanced Efficiency in Wireless Sensor Networks”, 0-7695-0990-
8/01/$10.00 (C) 2001 IEEE
[10] The Linux Information Project , Routing Protocol Definition, November
21, 2005, [Online] Available: http://www.linfo.org/routing_protocol.html
[Accessed: May 5, 2019]
[11] I.F. Akyildiz, W. Su, Y. Sankarasubramaniam, E. Cayirci, “Wireless
sensor networks: a survey”- Computer Networks: The International
Journal of Computer and Telecommunications Networking archive
Volume 38 Issue 4, 15 March 2002, Pages 393-422
[12] S. Hedetniemi and A. Liestman, “A survey of gossiping and broadcasting
in communication networks,” Networks, Vol. 18, No. 4, pp. 319-349,
1988
[13] W. Heinzelman, J. Kulik, and H. Balakrishnan, “Adaptive protocols for
information dissemination in wireless sensor networks,” in the
Proceedings of the 5th Annual ACM/IEEE International Conference on
Mobile Computing and Networking, Seattle, WA, August 1999.
[14] W. Heinzelman, A. Chandrakasan, and H. Balakrishnan, "Energy-
efficient communication protocol for wireless sensor networks," in
theProceeding of the Hawaii International Conference System Sciences,
Hawaii, January 2000.
[15] Thomas Watteyne & OpenWSN Admin, RPL, Nov 19, 2012,
https://openwsn.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/OW/pages/688151/RPL
[16] Islam, Md. Motaharul and Huh, Eui-Nam.: Sensor Proxy Mobile IPv6
(SPMIPv6) |A Novel Scheme for Mobility Supported IP-WSNs. Sensors
2(11), 1865-1887 (2011).
[17] Islam, Md Motaharul, and Eui-Nam Huh.: A novel addressing scheme
for PMIPv6 based global IP-WSNs. Sensors 11(9),8430-8455 (2011).
[18] Islam, Md Motaharul, Eui-Nam Huh.: Energy Efficient Multilayer
Routing Protocol for SPMIPv6 based IP-WSN. Int. J. of Sensor
Networks, Vol.18, No.3/4, pp.114 - 129, 2015.
[19] Islam, Md Motaharul, Sang-Ho Na, Seung-Jin Lee, Eui-Nam Huh.: A
novel scheme for PMIPv6 based Wireless Sensor Network. Proc. 4th
International Conference on Information Security and Assurance,
Springer-Verlag LNCS 6485, Miyazaki, Japan, pp. 429-438, June 23 -25,
2010.
[20] Islam, Md Motaharul, Tien Dung Nguyen, Aymen Abdullah Al Saffar,
Sang-Ho Na and Eui-Nam Huh.: Energy Efficient Framework for
Mobility Supported Smart IP-WSN. Proc. 2nd International Conference
on Computational Collective Intelligence, Technologies and
Applications, Springer-Verlag LNAI 6423, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, pp. 282-
291, November 10-12, 2010
[21] Dr.H S Ramesh Babu, Urmila Dey, “Routing Protocols in IPv6 enabled
LoWPAN: A Survey,” International Journal of Scientific and Research
Publications, Volume 4, Issue 2, February 2014, ISSN 2250-3153
[22] Kemal Akkaya and Mohamed Younis, “A Survey on Routing Protocols
for Wireless Sensor Networks” - Ad Hoc Networks Volume 3, Issue 3,
May 2005, Pages 325–349
[23] Panagiotis Karkazis, Panagiotis Trakadas, Helen C. Leligou, Lambros
Sarakis, Ioannis Papaefstathiou & Theodore Zahariadis, “Evaluating
routing metric composition approaches for QoS differentiation in low
power and lossy networks”- Wireless Networks August 2013, Volume 19,
Issue 6, pp 1269-1284
[24] Olfa Gaddour, Anis Koubâa, “RPL in a nutshell: A survey”, CISTER-TR-
130203 Date: 02-14-2013
[25] Computer Hope, Routing algorithm, June 21, 2017, [Online]. Available:
http://www.vmsk.org/Layman.pdf. [Accessed: May 5, 2019]