An energy-efficient routing protocol using newton-raphson and fuzzy c-means clustering

Abstract In order to address the low performance of current algorithms,a new energy-efficient hybrid clustering and hierarchical routing protocol (NRBO-FCM) was proposed. The key innovations include: NRBO-optimized initialization of FCM cluster centers to enhance convergence stability; Dynamic CH selection with energy-adaptive weighting coefficients; and a dual-layer hierarchical routing framework integrating Direct Cluster Heads (DCH) and Central Cluster Heads (CCH). Specifically, the protocol introduces a round-based clustering mechanism to reduce setup overhead. The Newton-Raphson optimization (NRBO) is employed to refine initial FCM centroids, while nodes are strategically classified into Near-Cluster nodes (NCs) and Far-Cluster nodes (FCs) groups - with NRBO-FCM exclusively applied to FCs. CH selection is governed by a residual-energy-sensitive adaptation function that automatically balances node workloads. For routing optimization, the hybrid DCH/CCH architecture minimizes multi-hop transmission costs, supplemented by a fitness-based relay selection algorithm. The superiority of the proposed algorithm was demonstrated through simulation results, which showed a reduction in overall network energy consumption, an extension of network lifespan, and an increase in the total amount of data received by the base station (BS) compared with previous algorithms.