Energy-Efficient Data Collection in UAV Enabled Wireless Sensor Network

TLDR

Wireless sensor networks use UAVs as mobile data collectors to extend network lifetime by reducing sensor energy consumption. The study aims to jointly optimize sensor wake‑up schedules and UAV trajectories to minimize the maximum sensor energy use while reliably collecting the required data over fading SN‑UAV links. The authors model the problem as a mixed‑integer non‑convex optimization and employ successive convex optimization to iteratively obtain a sub‑optimal solution. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme yields substantial energy savings compared to benchmark approaches.

Abstract

In wireless sensor networks, utilizing the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as a mobile data collector for the sensor nodes (SNs) is an energy-efficient technique to prolong the network lifetime. In this letter, considering a general fading channel model for the SN-UAV links, we jointly optimize the SNs' wake-up schedule and UAV's trajectory to minimize the maximum energy consumption of all SNs, while ensuring that the required amount of data is collected reliably from each SN. We formulate our design as a mixed-integer non-convex optimization problem. By applying the successive convex optimization technique, an efficient iterative algorithm is proposed to find a sub-optimal solution. Numerical results show that the proposed scheme achieves significant network energy saving as compared to benchmark schemes.