Hex-Path-An Energy Efficient Path Planning Mechanism for Mobile Anchor based Localization in Wireless Sensor Networks

In applications like patient monitoring and surveillance systems, the sensed data becomes meaningful only when they are accompanied by the location information. Thus accurate localization is highly inevitable. But in the same time, a Wireless Sensor Network is expected to live long to justify the effort and cost involved in establishing the network. Energy stringent standards are the need of the day in WSN. Much work has been done to improve the localization accuracy and fewer in improving the energy efficiency. Deployed sensor nodes often make use of mobile anchor assisted localization techniques. An important challenge often overlooked in these schemes is the path taken by the mobile anchor. The path can greatly influence the time needed for localization and most importantly the energy needed. In this paper, a novel approach, called Hex-Path, for anchor path planning has been proposed. The proposed strategy has been applied to a high precision localization technique called MAP-GSA and has also been compared with existing path planning mechanisms. Simulation results show the efficiency of the proposed approach in minimizing the energy needed for localization, thus improving the Network Lifetime.