FER-Restricted AUV-Relaying Data Collection in Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Relaying is an effective method to achieve reliable and timely data collection, which is one of the most important parts of underwater acoustic sensor networks (UASNs). Considering that the relay position determines the reliability of relay communication, we study the problem of relay placement and place an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) to mobile relay data transmission and realize the reliable, low-latency, and low-energy data collection in UASNs. First, we formulate the relay positions that can meet a certain frame error rate (FER) requirement as the FER-restricted area (FRA), and approximate FRA with a three-dimensional geometry formula. The problem of reliable and timely data collection becomes planning a short AUV relaying trajectory under the FRA constraint. To this end, we propose a nearest-community (N-C) trajectory planning algorithm to design the AUV relay trajectory. A member grouping method and the necessity of position (NoP) concept are proposed to further reduce the relay positions and trajectory length of the AUV. Simulation results verify that the approximate FRA is more than 90% consistent with the real FRA and show that the N-C using NoP-based member grouping can successfully receive more packets per minute and consume fewer sensors' energy than other algorithms.