An Effective Data-Collection Scheme with AUV Path Planning in Underwater Wireless Sensor Networks

Data collection in underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) using autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) is a more robust solution than traditional approaches, instead of transmitting data from each node to a destination node. However, the design of delay-aware and energy-efficient path planning for AUVs is one of the most crucial problems in collecting data for UWSNs. To reduce network delay and increase network lifetime, we proposed a novel reliable AUV-based data-collection routing protocol for UWSNs. The proposed protocol employs a route planning mechanism to collect data using AUVs. The sink node directs AUVs for data collection from sensor nodes to reduce energy consumption. First, sensor nodes are organized into clusters for better scalability, and then, these clusters are arranged into groups to assign an AUV to each group. Second, the traveling path for each AUV is crafted based on the Markov decision process (MDP) for the reliable collection of data. The simulation results affirm the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed technique in terms of throughput, energy efficiency, delay, and reliability.