Distributed Vertex Cover Algorithms For Wireless Sensor Networks

Vertex covering has important applications for wireless sensor networks such as monitoring link failures, facility location, clustering, and data aggregation. In this study, we designed three algorithms for constructing vertex cover in wireless sensor networks. The first algorithm, which is an adaption of the Parnas & Ron's algorithm, is a greedy approach that finds a vertex cover by using the degrees of the nodes. The second algorithm finds a vertex cover from graph matching where Hoepman's weighted matching algorithm is used. The third algorithm firstly forms a breadth-first search tree and then constructs a vertex cover by selecting nodes with predefined levels from breadth-first tree. We show the operation of the designed algorithms, analyze them, and provide the simulation results in the TOSSIM environment. Finally we have implemented, compared and assessed all these approaches. The transmitted message count of the first algorithm is smallest among other algorithms where the third algorithm has turned out to be presenting the best results in vertex cover approximation ratio.