A Matching Game-Based Data Collection Algorithm with Mobile Collectors

Data collection is one of the key technologies in wireless sensor networks. Due to the limited battery resources of sensors, mobile collectors are introduced to collect data instead of multi-hop data relay. However, how to decrease the data delay based on the cooperation of mobile collectors is a main problem. To solve this problem, a matching game-based data collection algorithm is proposed. First, some high-level cluster heads are elected. Second, by introducing a matching game model, the data collection problem is modeled as a one to one matching problem. Then, according to the preferences of mobile collectors and cluster heads, the benefit matrices are established. Based on the proposed matching algorithm, each mobile collector selects a cluster head to collect the data packets. Performance analysis proves that the matching result is stable, optimal, and unique. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm is superior to other existing approach in terms of the reduction in data delay.