Routing packets in Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is challenging due to the distribution of sensor nodes with different ability. Inefficient routing may lead to higher failure rate, higher latency and higher energy consumption. One of the common approaches to solve this problem is by using bio-inspired routing algorithms due to their abilities to adapt with dynamic environment. This paper proposed an improved ant colony system for packing routing in WSN that focuses on exploration and exploitation techniques. In the proposed routing algorithm, the best path to be used for packet transmission will be determined by considering the remaining energy of each sensor node to reduce the hotspot problem. Local pheromone update and global pheromone update are used with the aim to prevent imbalanced energy depletion of sensor nodes and to balance the packet distribution. The proposed routing algorithm was validated against several bio-inspired routing algorithms in medium and large sized networks. The results suggested that it has outperformed in terms of success rate, packet loss rate, latency and energy efficiency.
