A novel disjoint set division algorithm for joint scheduling and routing in wireless sensor networks

High network connectivity and low energy consumption are two major challenges in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). It is even more challenging to achieve both at the same time. To tackle the problem, this paper proposes a novel disjoint Set Division (SEDO) algorithm for joint scheduling and routing in WSNs. We finely divide sensors into different disjoint sets with guaranteed connectivity based on their geographical locations to monitor the interested area. We propose a class of scheduling and routing algorithms, which sequentially schedule each disjoint set to be on and off and balance the energy consumption during packet transmission. Simulation results show that SEDO outperforms existing schemes with lower packet delivery latency and longer network lifetime.