An adaptive relay node selection algorithm based on opportunity.

The collaborative relay network plays an important role in a smart grid application thanks to its high efficiency. However, energy and bandwidth management need to be further improved to extend network life cycle and reduce potential network segmentation. Aiming to balance the network energy consumption, this paper proposes an adaptive relay node selection algorithm based on the opportunity (OAR). In OAR, the potential relay nodes are chosen to act as candidates based on bit error rate (BER) estimation, and then, the relay is adaptively and opportunistically determined for packet forwarding. Residual energy is considered to avoid fast energy exhaustion for some certain nodes. The simulation results show that the proposed OAR algorithm improves the network performance by deferring the earliest death time of the nodes and extending the network life cycle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]