Drone Applications in Wireless Sensor Networks - Research Article

International Journal of Distributed

Sensor Networks
2019, Vol. 15(11)
Bio-inspired clustering scheme for Ó The Author(s) 2019
DOI: 10.1177/1550147719889900
Internet of Drones application in journals.sagepub.com/home/dsn

industrial wireless sensor network

Farooq Aftab1 , Ali Khan1 and Zhongshan Zhang2

Abstract
Recent technological improvements have revolutionized the wireless sensor network–based industrial sector with the
emergence of Internet of Things. Internet of Drones, a branch of Internet of Things, is used for the communication
among drones. As drones are mobile in nature, they cause frequent topological changes. This changing topology causes
scalability, stability, and route selection issues in Internet of Drones. To handle these issues, we propose a bio-inspired
clustering scheme using dragonfly algorithm for cluster formation and management. In this article, we propose cluster
head election based on the connectivity with the base station along with the fitness function which consists of residual
energy and position of the drones. Furthermore, for route selection we propose an optimal path selection based on the
residual energy and position of drone for efficient communication. The proposed scheme shows better results as com-
pared to other bio-inspired clustering algorithms on the basis of evaluation benchmarks such as cluster building time,
network energy consumption, cluster lifetime, and probability of successful delivery. The results indicate that the pro-
posed scheme has improved 60% and 38% with respect to ant colony optimization and grey wolf optimization, respec-
tively, in terms of average cluster building time while average energy consumption has improved 23% and 33% when
compared to the ant colony optimization and grey wolf optimization, respectively.

Keywords
Internet of Drones, bio-inspired, wireless sensor network, dragonfly algorithm, clustering, routing

Date received: 27 February 2019; accepted: 31 October 2019

Handling Editor: Sadik Gharghan

Introduction storage. The rapidly growing industrial data make it

With the advancement of wireless communication tech-
nologies and wireless sensor networks (WSNs), new
doors of evolution are opened for industrial sector. In
the industry, the deployment of WSN can facilitate in
fault and resource indication, product development,
and quality management.1 The data collection process
from various machines, sensors, and actuators and
access to data and devices can be enabled via Internet
in an industrial environment, giving birth to Industrial
Internet of Things (IIoT). IIoT benefits in overall effi-
ciency by improving the cost with minimal human
involvement. Typical IIoT applications have centra-
lized model (cloud) for exhaustive data processing and
challenging for data transmission over a network. The
interface between network of drones and WSN will
help to mitigate the transmission issue.
1
School of Computer and Communication Engineering, University of
Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing, China
2
School of Information and Electronics, Beijing Institute of Technology,
Beijing, China
Corresponding author:
Zhongshan Zhang, School of Information and Electronics, Beijing Institute
of Technology, Beijing 100081, China.
Email: zhangzs@bit.edu.cn

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2 International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks
(a)
Figure 1. Network topology architecture in IoD: (a) the swarm of drones collaborate to form a network for forwarding the
information to the destination and (b) standalone topology where a single drone can transmit data via satellite.
Drones have become an emerging technology with
sensing, processing, storage, and communication cap-
abilities. They can be used in different industries such
as intelligent transportation systems, smart cities,2–6
and Internet of things (IoT) scenarios.7 The deployment
of swarm of drones for IoT services has become reality
for various applications such as package delivery,8
public safety,9 search and rescue,10 tracking, and surveil-
lance.11–13 These IoT-enabled applications have paved
the way for the new paradigm named as Internet of
Drones (IoD).14
The characteristics of drones such as easy deploy-
ment and mobility make them useful for communica-
tion. The network topology can be of two types,
namely, standalone and clustered.15 In standalone
topology, a single drone can transmit data via satellite
as shown in Figure 1(b), while in clustered network
topology the data transmission occurs through inter-
mediate drones. As drones are mobile, they can be used
as information carriers, that is, forward the informa-
tion to the distant destination. If the destination is not
in direct communication range of the drone, the com-
munication occurs via multiple hops (Figure 1(a)). The
swarm of drones collaborate to form a network for for-
warding the information to the destination. Although
survivability, scalability, and reliability are the distinc-
tive attributes of IoD, they bring more challenges in
communication as well as networking of drones.16 The
high mobility of drones makes the topology to change
rapidly, resulting in communication problems.
Drones have scarce battery resource and limited
computational power which can influence the overall
communication efficiency in IoD. In order to efficiently
utilize these scarce resources, developing a communication
(b)
mechanism that ensures lower routing overhead and lower
computational complexity and yields higher throughput
can be a challenging task. The routing mechanisms for
efficient communication is required for the transmission
of information among drones. The rapidly changing
topology and the mobility of drones in IoD make the
communication among drones a critical task.14 The
answer to these problems is the hierarchal routing known
as clustering.17
In clustering, which is the formation of network into
sub-groups, a cluster comprises cluster head (CH) and
cluster members (CMs). A CH is elected among all the
members in the cluster and it controls the performance
of cluster by managing it in an efficient and effective
way. Thus, CH selection is one of the important tasks
of clustering and each CM can be a candidate for CH
selection. Instead of single-hop communication net-
working, multi-hop cluster-based networking results in
better performance and scalability.18 In clustering algo-
rithms, cluster formation and CH election is a vital
process to efficiently maintain cluster topology.
Subsequent change in relative position of CMs com-
pletely alters the whole cluster topology. The rapidly
changing topology in IoD makes the cluster formation
and management a difficult task and drains the drones’
energy resource. There is a need to develop efficient
clustering algorithm for better scalability and efficiency
of rapidly changing topology and effective use of
energy resource.
The swarm intelligence (SI)19 based methods can be
used for near-optimal solutions. In an ad hoc approach,
there is no central control which results in increasing
complexity in configuration and management. There is
a need to design such networking algorithms that have
Aftab et al.
self-organizing capabilities such as self-configuring,
self-healing, self-optimization, and adaptive to the envi-
ronment. Bio-inspired mechanisms such as ant colony
optimization (ACO)20 and grey wolf optimization
(GWO)21 have been proposed for clustering in ad hoc
networks. But these algorithms are inefficient resulting
in high energy consumption and low cluster lifetime.
Keeping in mind the constraints of IoD, our main
focus is to efficiently handle the challenges of topology
management for better communication in IoD. Our
contributions are as follows:
1. In this article, we propose an interface architec-
ture between industrial WSN and IoD network
by considering smart WSN gateway node. We
also propose a bio-inspired clustering scheme
for IoD (BICIoD) by using the dragonfly algo-
rithm (DA).
2. We propose CH selection and cluster formation
based on the connectivity with the BS along
with fitness function comprising residual energy
level and position of the drones. The drone with
the highest fitness will be elected as CH, while
rest of the drones become its member.
3. For efficient network management, we propose
DA-inspired cluster management. The position
of all the drones is updated according to the
DA.
4. For communication among drones, the next
hop drone is selected based on optimal path
selection mechanism which consists of residual
energy level and position of drones.
5. To verify the performance efficiency of our pro-
pose scheme, we analyze our scheme with other
bio-inspired clustering algorithms such as gray
wolf optimization (GWO) and ant colony opti-
mization (ACO).
Related work
Recently there have been several researches proposed
to solve routing issues using clustering in ad hoc net-
works. Hussein et al.22 proposed flexible weighted clus-
tering algorithm which is based on battery power. The
basic goal of this algorithm is to prevent nodes having
low battery power to be elected as CH. Ni et al.23 pro-
posed a mobility prediction–based clustering algorithm
by using estimation of speed of nodes relative to each
other. Every node compiles the average relative speed
of the neighboring nodes by exchanging Hello packets
with each other. The node having lowest relative mobi-
lity is selected as a CH and other nodes become the
CMs. However, the high mobility of nodes decreases
the lifetime of CH.
3
The authors proposed mobility prediction clustering
algorithm (MPCA),24 a combination of dictionary
structure prediction and link expiration time (LET), for
drones network. LET between two drones is calculated
by using location and mobility information of drones.
The CH is elected on the basis of largest weight of
neighboring drones and CH then broadcasts the CH
announcement to the neighboring drones. The drone
which receives several messages considers CH with lon-
ger LET. Shi and Luo25 proposed a mechanism of
cluster-based location aided dynamic source routing
(CBLADSR) which is a weight-based clustering. In
CBLADSR, the CH is elected on the basis of highest
energy level, low relative speed, and having a large
number of neighboring drones. Every drone maintains
neighbor table of all the neighboring drones for com-
munication and CH election. The drone with highest
weight factor among others becomes the CH.
Khelifi et al.26 proposed a weighted centroid locali-
zation based clustering mechanism where the drone
position is calculated using fuzzy logic. The CH is
elected on the basis of the location, calculated by the
received signal strength indicator (RSSI) between two
drones. After the cluster formation, the distances for all
drones are calculated by the received RSSI values. CH
becomes responsible for the transmission of informa-
tion from CMs to the distant base station (BS).
Another RSSI-based hybrid clustering scheme is pro-
posed by Okcu and Soyturk27 where a drone is consid-
ered as a mobile sink to collect data in WSN. The CH
election is based on the residual energy and position of
nodes near to the drone. The nodes which are not in
the range of the drone are connected to CH via multi-
ple hops. The sensor nodes continuously record the
RSSI values from drone beacons which are considered
for the clustering. The highest value of RSSI is consid-
ered for the CH election.
Yu et al.28 proposed a bio-inspired mobility predic-
tion clustering mechanism by combining the mobility
factor of drones and foraging model of Physarum poly-
cephalum to the drone network. For CH election, all
drones calculate the value of neighboring drones. The
drone with the highest probability becomes the CH and
the rest of the drones become its members. In another
research, Yang et al.29 proposed a mechanism for effi-
cient routing strategy in drones network by integrating
the clustering features of WSNs and drone. Network is
divided into multiple clusters, and all the sensor nodes
in the cluster are stationary and location aware. The
drone knows the exact location information of all the
CHs of the clusters. The moving drone collects data
from the CHs and routes it based on ACO. Bahloul
et al.30 proposed a hybrid mechanism for communica-
tion among drones based on boid Reynolds and
AODV protocol. Their proposed solution has three
4 International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks
Figure 2. Proposed architectural interface of IoD and industrial WSN.
steps: AODV for reactive routing computation, boids
Reynolds method for connectivity, and discovery of
ground BS. Boid Reynolds method is a bio-inspired
method for maintaining the formation of birds’ flock
or school of fish with three basic rules of separation,
alignment, and cohesion.
Maistrenko et al.31 proposed a routing algorithm
based on ACO for optimal route between drones in
FANET. ACO utilizes the behavioral study of ants for
finding optimal path to the food. The forward ants
move toward the food leave pheromones in their path.
The backward ants follow that route with the highest
value of pheromones for the optimal route to the desti-
nation. Al-Aboody et al.32 proposed a multi-level hier-
archical routing protocol which is a hybrid clustering
algorithm for selection of CH in three levels of the net-
work. In first level, the CH is selected based on the dis-
tance from BS, residual energy, and ratio of energy
consumption. The second level uses the probabilistic
selection of CH based on GWO algorithm. The CH is
selected based on fitness function which consists of resi-
dual energy and number of neighboring nodes. Whereas
for the third level, a distributed tree-based approach is
used for CH selection. But due to high computation,
these clustering algorithms are inefficient resulting in
high energy consumption and low cluster lifetime.
System model
WSN has a lot of applications in industrial domain.
The integration of industrial WSN and IoD can open
new doors toward deployment of future generation net-
works. Ideal clustering is an NP-hard problem33 and is
more difficult in IoD-based WSN network. Therefore,
we propose dragonfly34 SI-based optimization scheme
which can be useful to find near-optimal solutions
which is desirable for IoD-based WSN network.
Similarly, in cluster-based ad hoc networks, finding an
optimal clustering solution for cluster formation and
maintenance is more challenging in IoD-based net-
work. In this article, we have considered a special case
where we perform integration between industrial WSN
and IoD. Figure 2 explains in detail about our pro-
posed architecture for collaboration between industrial
WSN and IoD. In our system model, we have consid-
ered following assumptions. Every factory consists of
its own WSN network which is connected with Smart
WSN Gateway Node (SGN). If a WSN network needs
Aftab et al. 5

to transmit any data packets to BS, it will transmit

(a) (d)
those packets to SGN. SGN has an ability to process
the data received from WSNs and transmit it to a
drone network after establishing a connection. As a
result, SGN acts as a gateway between industrial WSN
and IoD. A three-way packet handshaking between
SGN and a drone will ensure connectivity when an (b)
SGN lies within a coverage range of a drone. This
packet handshaking is explained in the ‘‘Drone com- (e)
munication’’ section. After connectivity with SGN,
drone will receive data packets, and using its deployed
network technology, drones will transmit those received (c)
packets to BS. In this article, we have considered a
cluster–based drone network topology instead of stan-
dalone topology to ensure effective and efficient com-
munication between drones in IoD network by keeping
in mind our setup of industrial WSNs. We assume
drones in IoD network can directly access the cloud Figure 3. DA Swarm patterns: (a) separation, (b) alignment, (c)
facility using satellite link in any special case if needed. cohesion, (d) attraction for food, and (e) distraction from enemy.
To manage the cluster-based drone network topology,
BICIoD scheme is proposed in this article to ensure
proper data communication between industrial WSN where X is the current position, Xk represents the posi-
and BS using cluster-based deployed topology of tion of kth neighboring individual, and number of
drones. neighbors is represented by N.
The alignment Ai is when the individual matches the
velocity of other neighbors and is given by
Bio-inspired clustering scheme
PN
For better network management and efficient commu- k =1 Vk
Ai = ð2Þ
nication among drones, we propose a clustering scheme N
for IoD inspired by DA. The DA34 calculates the opti- where Vk represents the velocity of kth neighboring
mal position of dragonfly. individual.
The cohesion Ci is the tendency of individuals
toward the center and is calculated as
Mathematical model of DA
PN
Dragonflies have unique swarming behavior which k=1 Xk
comprises hunting (static swarm) and migration Ci = X ð3Þ
N
(dynamic swarm). The static swarm has main charac-
teristics as local movement and rapid changes in the The attraction Fi toward the source of food can be
flying route. In static swarm, dragonflies hunt for the calculated by
food while flying back and forth in a small group, while
in dynamic swarm, swarm of dragonflies move in one Fi = X +  X ð4Þ
direction over a long distance. These swarming beha-
where X + is the position of the food source.
viors are similar to the two phases of optimization
The distraction Ei from an enemy is given by
using meta-heuristics, namely exploration and exploita-
tion, respectively.34 Ei = X   X ð5Þ
In DA, there are five main factors for updating the
position of dragonfly in swarms and are named as where X  represents the enemy’s position.
separation, alignment, cohesion, attraction, and dis- The swarming behavior of dragonflies is the combi-
traction as shown in Figure 3. nation of these factors. For updating the position of
The separation Si is the collision avoidance from dragonflies, two vectors namely step (DX ) and position
each other in the neighbor range and is calculated as (X ) are considered. The step vector shows the direction
of movement for the dragonfly34 and is defined by
X
N
Si = X  Xk ð1Þ
DXt + 1 = ðsSi + aAi + cCi + fFi + eEi Þ + wDXt ð6Þ
k=1
6 International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks

Figure 4. Cluster formation mechanism for BICIoD.

where s, a, and c are the separation, alignment, and where G(x) = (x  1)!.
cohesion weights, respectively, while f and e are the The position of dragonfly can be updated by the fol-
food and enemy factors, respectively. w represents the lowing equation
inertial weight and t shows current iteration.
After the calculation of step vector, the position vec- Xt + 1 = Xt + Levyðd Þ 3 Xt ð10Þ
tor is calculated as follows
where d shows the dimension of position vectors.
Xt + 1 = Xt + DXt + 1 ð7Þ

For exploration, search space is done using random CH election and cluster formation
walk (Levy flight)34 and is calculated as follows
For efficient communication and data transmission,
r1 3 s our clustering approach considers the selection of CH
Levyð xÞ = 0:01 3 1 ð8Þ on the basis of connectivity with the BS and fitness
jr2 jb
function which depends on the residual energy level and
where r1 and r2 are the random numbers ranges ½0, 1, b the position of drone. The cluster formation mechanism
shows the constant, and s is given by is illustrated in Figure 4. The fitness is calculated as

  !1=b Fitness = w1 3 f1 + w2 3 f2 ð11Þ

Gð1 + bÞ 3 sin pb
s=   2  ð9Þ
G 1 +2 b 3 b 3 2 b1
2
where w1 + w2 = 1.
Aftab et al. 7

The function for residual energy of the drone is

given by Algorithm 1. CH election and Cluster Formation

For every drone in IoD

X
n
f1 = RE = ðIELi  CELi Þ ð12Þ
i=1
Here, RE is the residual energy level, IELi represents
the initial energy level of the ith drone, and the current
energy level of the ith drone is given by CELi .
The function for position of drone is given by
f2 = Xt + 1 by equation (10) ð13Þ
Scenario 1: single drone has connectivity with the BS
When a drone needs to send some information but it is
not in the range of BS, the coalition of drones is formed
in an ad hoc manner. The drone then transmits infor-
mation to the destination through multi-hops via inter-
mediate drones. The drone which has the connectivity
with the BS will declare itself as CH and will transmit
the cluster formation message to other drones. The rest
of the drones will become its CMs.
Calculate Fitness using equation (12) and (13) based on
residual energy level and position;
Do (Transmit Hello message with fitness);
While (A drone receives a Hello message)
Check (connectivity with BS);
Compare (fitness with received fitness of other
drones);
Construct (Neighbor Table with drone entries);
Sort (Neighbor Table according to highest value of
fitness);
Update (Neighbor Table with every new Hello message);
While (more than 1 drone has connectivity with BS or no
drone has direct connectivity with BS in a cluster)
Check (fitness information of drones from Neighbor
table);
if (drone has the highest fitness)
Transmit Cluster Formation message (CH claim);
Declare (Itself a CH);
Else
Wait for (Cluster Formation message);
Consider (Drone with highest fitness as a CH);
Transmit Cluster joining message (CH recognize);
end

Scenario 2: more than one drone has connectivity

with the BS
When more than one drone is connected with the BS,
then the fitness is evaluated based on residual energy
and position of the drone. The drone with the highest
fitness among other drones having connectivity with
the ground control station will be elected as CH.

Scenario 3: when there is no direct connectivity with

the BS
If there is not any drone which has a direct connectivity
with the BS, then communication can occur via a relay
drone of other cluster. The election of CH will be based
on fitness, the drone with the highest fitness will be
elected as CH and the rest of the drones become its
CMs.
Considering these three scenarios of topology con-
figuration, the CH election and cluster formation is
explained by Algorithm 1.

Cluster management
Cluster management of our proposed BICIoD is per-
formed according to the DA as depicted in Figure 5.
The position of each dragonfly (Drone CM) is updated
according to the movement based on separation, align- Figure 5. Cluster management mechanism for BICIoD.
ment, and cohesion as shown in Figure 6. The CMs
need to follow the movement of the CH and adjust their topology table from the received position information
position accordingly as explained by Algorithm 2. The of all the drones in a cluster. Based on the updated posi-
CH manages the cluster by continuously updating the tion if a drone moves out of the neighborhood range,
8 International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks
Figure 6. DA swarm patterns for drone cluster management in
BICIoD.
Algorithm 2. Cluster Management
For every Drone i in IoD where i = 1, 2, 3, ..., N
Position value (using equation (7))
Every Drone i in a cluster do
Transmit (Topology Configuration message)
While (CH receive Topology Configuration message)
Calculate (position from topology configuration message
Update (Drone position in cluster topology table);
Transmit (confirmation message with cluster topology
table);
end
that drone is no longer a member of the cluster. The
CH then transmits the updated topology table to the
CMs and maintains the cluster.
Drone communication
For a connection establishment between a drone and
an SGN, the SGN waits to be within the coverage
range of a drone. When a drone senses an SGN within
its coverage range, it will transmit an Identification
(IDF) message. When the SGN receives the
Identification (IDF) message from the drone, it will
transmit an Acknowledgment (ACK) message as a
reply to ensure successful recognition of a drone net-
work. The drone after receiving ACK message from
the SGN will transmit clear to send (CTS) message to
the SGN. After receiving CTS, the SGN is ready to
send data packets to the drone. This three-way hand-
shaking between a drone and an SGN ensures connec-
tivity as shown in Figure 7 and a drone is ready to
receive the data packet from SGN.
Figure 7. Handshaking between drone and SGN.
When a drone receives a data packet from SGN,
there is a need for an efficient routing mechanism and
optimal route selection for transmission of data to BS.
In the proposed BICIoD, all the drones follow the posi-
tion of CH and adjust their position accordingly. The
optimal route is selected based on the residual energy
and position of drone for load balancing and conges-
tion control. The drone which lies in the neighborhood
range of the source drone and has the best position
(that is near to the source drone) with higher residual
energy will be considered for the next hop. The pro-
posed working mechanism is shown in Figure 8. The
routing of data packets that occurs using this optimal
route will lead to lower energy consumption of the
network and consequently increases the cluster
lifetime.
Results and discussion
The proposed scheme BICIoD is evaluated on the basis
of cluster building time, energy consumption, cluster
lifetime, and probability of delivery success compared
with GWO32 and ACO31 clustering algorithms. The
simulations are performed in MATLAB with varying
grid size and number of drones in a network. Rest of
the parameters are given in the Table 1.
The time taken by the clustering algorithms from
taking nodes with their corresponding fitness value as
input to producing outputs the election of CH and
associate member nodes is called as cluster building
time which represents the computational complexity of
that algorithm. As drones have low computational
resources, higher cluster building will affect its perfor-
mance. Higher cluster building time also increases the
energy consumption resulting in lower cluster lifetime.
From Figures 9 to 11, it can be seen that the insertion
of more drones into the network results in higher clus-
ter building time. The proposed BICIoD outperforms
GWO and ACO as our proposed scheme takes less time
in building a cluster. This lower cluster building time
reduces the delay for optimal route selection resulting
in energy saving during complex computations. The
Aftab et al. 9

Table 1. Simulation parameters.

Parameters Values

Grid size 100031000 m2 , 200032000 m2 ,

and 300033000 m2
Number of drones 15, 20, 25, 30, 35
Minimum distance 5m
between drones
Mobility model Reference point mobility
model
Simulation time 120 s
Transmission range Dynamic
Drone’s initial energy level 80 W h
Position exchange interval 2s
Receiver sensitivity 90 dBm
Transmission frequency 2:45 GHz
Constant bit rate 100 kbp

Figure 9. Cluster building time versus number of drones

(grid size 100031000 m2 ).

Figure 10. Cluster building time versus number of drones

(grid size 200032000 m2 ).

are three main mechanisms which consume energy in

Figure 8. Working mechanism of communication between
drones.
results indicate that BICIoD has improved 60% and
38% average cluster building time as compared to
ACO and GWO, respectively.
The total energy consumption is the energy con-
sumed by the algorithm for the whole network. There
drones: energy needed to operate drone, energy con-
sumed by the sensors mounted on the drone, and
energy consumed in communication which is also the
main source of energy consumption. From Figures 12
to 14, it can be seen that increasing the number of
drones in the network consumes more energy. From the
results, it is clear that our BICIoD performs better as
compared with the other two clustering schemes. Lower
energy consumption of our proposed scheme is because
of the energy aware CH election and cluster manage-
ment. It can be noted that the average energy
10
Figure 11. Cluster building time versus number of drones
(grid size 300033000 m2 ).
Figure 12. Energy consumption versus number of drones
(grid size 100031000 m2 ).
consumption of BICIoD has improved 23% and 33%
when compared with that of ACO and GWO,
respectively.
The cluster lifetime is the total time for which the
cluster is from till its disposition. During clustering, the
drone with the highest fitness is elected as the CH and
then it takes the responsibility of managing the whole
cluster. Over time, the performance of CH degrades
due to the operations and when it falls below the thresh-
old level, the CH re-election takes place. Shorter cluster
International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks
Figure 13. Energy consumption versus number of drones
(grid size 200032000 m2 ).
Figure 14. Energy consumption versus number of drones
(grid size 300033000 m2 ).
lifetime means the clustering algorithm frequently needs
to be executed resulting in the increase in communica-
tion as well as computational overheads in the network.
Figures 15–17 show that our BICIoD performs better
than GWO and ACO. It can also be seen from the
graphs, with the insertion of more drones, that the clus-
ter life time decreases. This is due to the fact that as
there are more members in a cluster, it causes the topol-
ogy to change more frequently. From the results it can
be seen that the overall network lifetime of BICIoD has
Aftab et al.
Figure 15. Cluster lifetime versus number of drones
(grid size 100031000 m2 ).
Figure 16. Cluster lifetime versus number of drones
(grid size 200032000 m2 ).
improved 1.1 times and 1.3 times as compared to ACO
and GWO, respectively.
Probability of successful delivery is how successfully
the packets are delivered at all intermediary nodes on
the basis of the average hop count per packet. From
Figure 18, it can be seen that BICIoD performs better
when compared with ACO and GWO in terms of prob-
ability of successful delivery. With the increase in the
number of drones in a network, the network density
increases and hence probability of successful delivery
increases. This is due to the fact that with the insertion
of more drones in a network, the packet drop ratio
decreases.
11
Figure 17. Cluster lifetime versus number of drones
(grid size 300033000 m2 ).
Figure 18. Probability of successful delivery versus number of
drones.
Conclusion and future work
In this article, we proposed bio-inspired clustering
scheme for IoD. The main issue of routing in IoD is
that the drones are mobile in nature, hence causing fre-
quent topology changes. We optimized the topology
for efficient communication in IoD by means of effi-
cient CH election based on the connectivity with the
BS along with the residual energy and position of the
drones. The cluster is managed according to the DA by
updating the position of the drones. Furthermore, for
route selection we propose an optimal path selection
based on the residual energy and position of drone for
12
efficient communication. The results of our proposed
BICIoD are compared with ACO and GWO clustering
algorithms. The results show our BICIoD has better
performance as compared with the other bio-inspired
clustering algorithms in terms of cluster building time,
energy consumption, cluster lifetime, and probability of
successful delivery. The results indicate that the pro-
posed scheme has improved 60% and 38% with respect
to ACO and GWO, respectively, in terms of average
cluster building time while average energy consumption
has improved 23% and 33%, when compared to ACO
and GWO, respectively. In the future work, we will
improve the overall performance of the proposed
scheme by using hybrid methodology.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This work was supported in part by the Key Project
of the National Natural Science Foundation of China under
Grant 61431001, in part by the Open Research Fund of
National Mobile Communications Research Laboratory,
Southeast University, under Grant 2017D02, in part by the
Key Laboratory of Cognitive Radio and Information
Processing, Ministry of Education, Guilin University of
Electronic Technology, in part by the Foundation of Beijing
Engineering and Technology Center for Convergence
Networks and Ubiquitous Services, and in part Beijing
Institute of Technology Research Fund Program for Young
Scholars.
ORCID iD
Farooq Aftab https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2939-466X
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