Energy-Efficient Markov-Based Lifetime Enhancement Approach for Underwater Acoustic Sensor Network

The multihop underwater acoustic sensor network (M-UASN) collects oceanographic data at different depths. Due to the harsh underwater environment, the route is a major research problem. In this article, the routing path from source to sink is adapted by the vector-based forwarding (VBF) protocol. In VBF, based on the vector size, the packets are transmitted within the pipe from hop to hop. The limitation is that every node inside the pipe vector receives the same packets. That results in a waste of battery energy and, in turn, reduces the lifetime of the acoustic node. To enhance, in this article, it is divided into two parts. The first part is that the first hop nodes from the source are optimally divided into subsets such that all the second hop nodes will receive packets from each subset. This optimal route cover subset is identified with an evolutionary memetic algorithm. The election of subset is done through a voltage reference model, and the battery voltage is modeled mathematically and the role of the nodes is given based on the voltage profile and Markov probability approach. This method enhances the lifetime of the underwater acoustic network when compared with the VBF algorithm. The proposed model also provides improved throughput and equal load sharing. The results are compared with VBF, quality-of-service aware evolutionary routing protocol (QERP), and multiobjective optimized opportunistic routing (BMOOR).