An Optimal Energy-Efficient Path Selection Algorithm Based on Ant Colony-Genetic Optimization Scheme

Abstract

In this paper, inspired to the high-speed global search ability for genetic algorithm and the positive feedback mechanism for ant colony algorithm, our energy-efficient scheme, called ACGR, was proposed for routing optimization design, in which the communication messages, treated as ants with limited lifetime, are sent by nodes for searching the optimal routing path. Through the proposed scheme, multiple candidate routing paths could be obtained firstly. Then each candidate path is considered as a gene sequence and through the selection, crossover and mutation operations on them, the optimal energy routing path is determined. Simulation results have shown that the proposed algorithm provides promising solution because it takes into account the energy of each node, and extends the lifetime of the wireless sensor network.