[Paper Review] On Performance Evaluation of Variants of DEEC in WSNs

Talha Naeem Qureshi, Nadeem Javaid+3 more|arXiv (Cornell University)|Aug 12, 2012

Energy Efficient Wireless Sensor Networks10 references4 citations

TL;DR

This paper evaluates four DEEC variants—DEEC, DDEEC, EDEEC, and TDEEC—in heterogeneous Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) under varying levels of energy heterogeneity. Using simulations across multiple scenarios, it finds that TDEEC outperforms others in stability period and network lifetime, especially in low-heterogeneity and multilevel heterogeneous environments, while EDEEC shows strong performance in longevity, particularly when residual energy and cluster head selection are optimized for energy balance.

ABSTRACT

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) contain numerous sensor nodes having limited power resource, which report sensed data to the Base Station (BS) that requires high energy usage. Many routing protocols have been proposed in this regard achieving energy efficiency in heterogeneous scenarios. However, every protocol is not suitable for heterogeneous WSNs. Efficiency of protocol degrades while changing the heterogeneity parameters. In this paper, we first test Distributed Energy- Efficient Clustering (DEEC), Developed DEEC (DDEEC), Enhanced DEEC (EDEEC) and Threshold DEEC (TDEEC) under several different scenarios containing high level heterogeneity to low level heterogeneity. We observe thoroughly regarding the performance based on stability period, network life time and throughput. EDEEC and TDEEC perform better in all heterogeneous scenarios containing variable heterogeneity in terms of life time, however TDEEC is best of all for the stability period of the network. However, the performance of DEEC and DDEEC is highly effected by changing the heterogeneity parameters of the network.

Motivation & Objective

• To evaluate the performance of DEEC, DDEEC, EDEEC, and TDEEC in heterogeneous WSNs with varying degrees of energy heterogeneity.
• To analyze how changes in heterogeneity parameters (e.g., energy level ratios) affect protocol stability, lifetime, and throughput.
• To identify which variant maintains optimal performance across diverse network configurations, including three-level and multilevel heterogeneous scenarios.
• To compare the stability period, network lifetime, and data transmission efficiency of each protocol under controlled simulation conditions.

Proposed method

• Simulations were conducted across five distinct scenarios with varying energy heterogeneity levels, defined by parameters a, b, m, and m₀.
• Each protocol used a unique cluster head (CH) selection mechanism: DEEC based on residual-to-average energy ratio, DDEEC on residual energy alone, EDEEC on enhanced residual energy with super nodes, and TDEEC on threshold-based high-energy node selection.
• Performance was measured across key metrics: stability period (first and tenth node death), network lifetime (all nodes dead), and total packets sent to the Base Station (BS).
• Scenarios included three-level networks (normal, advanced, super nodes) and multileleve networks with random energy distributions.
• The evaluation used consistent network size (100 nodes), fixed communication range, and energy consumption models for transmission and reception.
• Results were visualized and compared across rounds to assess long-term energy efficiency and network durability.

Experimental results

Research questions

• RQ1 How do DEEC, DDEEC, EDEEC, and TDEEC perform under high versus low energy heterogeneity in three-level WSNs?
• RQ2 Which protocol maintains the longest stability period and network lifetime when energy differences between node types are minimized?
• RQ3 How does the inclusion of super nodes (in EDEEC and TDEEC) affect energy balance and network longevity in multilevel heterogeneous networks?
• RQ4 What is the relationship between parameter tuning (a, b, m, m₀) and protocol resilience across different network configurations?
• RQ5 Which protocol achieves the highest number of packets sent to the Base Station while minimizing energy depletion?

Key findings

• TDEEC achieved the longest stability period, with the first node dying at 1753 rounds and all nodes dead at 7467 rounds in the third scenario, outperforming all others.
• In the fifth scenario with high heterogeneity, TDEEC and EDEEC extended network lifetime beyond 10,000 rounds, with TDEEC sending 620,606 packets to the BS.
• EDEEC sent 562,819 packets to the BS in the fifth scenario, showing superior throughput and longevity compared to DEEC (224,095) and DDEEC (193,931).
• In multilevel heterogeneous networks with random energy levels, TDEEC again led in stability and lifetime, with all nodes dead at 6734 rounds and 314,848 packets sent to the BS.
• DEEC and DDEEC showed declining performance as heterogeneity increased, with DEEC dying out first in high-heterogeneity cases and sending the fewest packets.
• TDEEC consistently outperformed all others in stability period and network lifetime across all scenarios, especially in low-heterogeneity and multilevel configurations.