Optimized handover and resource management: an 802.21‐based scheme to optimize handover and resource management in hybrid satellite‐terrestrial networks

Satellite communications can provide fourth generation (4G) networks with large‐scale coverage. However, their integration to 4G is challenging because satellite networks have not been designed with handover in mind. The setup of satellite links takes time, and so, handovers must be anticipated long before. This paper proposes a generic scheme based on the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers 802.21 standard to optimize handover and resource management in hybrid satellite‐terrestrial networks. Our solution, namely optimized handover and resource management (OHRM), uses the terrestrial interface to prepare handover, which greatly speeds up the establishment of the satellite link. We propose two mechanisms to minimize the waste of bandwidth due to wrong handover predictions. First, we leverage the support of 802.21 in the terrestrial access network to shorten the path of the signaling messages towards the satellite resource manager. Second, we cancel the restoration of the satellite resources when the terrestrial link rolls back. We use OHRM to interconnect a digital video broadcasting and a wireless 4G terrestrial network. However for the simulation tool, we use a WiMAX as the terrestrial technology to illustrate the schemes. The simulation results show that OHRM minimizes the handover delay and the signaling overhead in the terrestrial and satellite networks. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Proposal of Optimal Routing Techniques for non-GEO Satellite Systems

The continuously increasing number of mobile subscribers has generated a strong interest in expanding terrestrial wireless networks and supporting real-time communications regardless of the user location. These targets require a cautious management of available resources since the development of global systems implies a quite high cost. Routing is an important network function and must be very carefully considered. This paper proposes the implementation of optimal routing techniques for connection oriented mode and variable network topology, as non-GEO satellite systems require. In particular a well known optimal routing technique, named Flow Deviation, is modified by adding new procedures that render its applicability to a handover environment feasible and effective. Its performance is investigated through extended real time simulations in terms of delay, throughput, link utilization and also in terms of parameters related to the topology variations and the interruptible operation of ISLs. The pros and cons of the proposed scheme are discussed with respect to the well known shortest path scheme and helpful conclusions for the design of satellite constellations are obtained.     

A model for the handover traffic in low earth-orbiting (LEO) satellite networks for personal communications

The spectacular growth of cellular telephone networks has demonstrated the demand for personal communications. Communication systems based on low earth orbit (LEO) constellations of satellites seem to be an adequate approach to achieve a world-wide network. When defining the capacity in terms of satellite circuits, the network designer has to take into account the handover traffic. Unfortunately, in a LEO communication network where handover is most often due to the network nodes motion, handover traffic models for terrestrial cellular networks cannot be used. Hence specific models must be developed. This paper proposes an analytical model for the handover in LEO satellite networks. This model is applied to different network configurations and compared to discrete-time simulations. Simulation results agree with those obtained from the analytical model.     

A New Connection Admission Control for Spotbeam Handover in LEO Satellite Networks

Frequent spotbeam handovers in low earth orbit (LEO) satellite networks require a technique to decrease the handover blocking probabilities. A large variety of schemes have been proposed to achieve this goal in terrestrial mobile cellular networks. Most of them focus on the notion of prioritized channel allocation algorithms. However, these schemes cannot provide the connection-level quality of service (QoS) guarantees. Due to the scarcity of resources in LEO satellite networks, a connection admission control (CAC) technique becomes important to achieve this connection-level QoS for the spotbeam handovers. In this paper, a geographical connection admission control (GCAC) algorithm is introduced, which estimates the future handover blocking performance of a new call attempt based on the user location database, in order to decrease the handover blocking. Also, for its channel allocation scheme, an adaptive dynamic channel allocation (ADCA) scheme is introduced. By simulation, it is shown that the proposed GCAC with ADCA scheme guarantees the handover blocking probability to a predefined target level of QoS. Since GCAC algorithm utilizes the user location information, performance evaluation indicates that the quality of service (QoS) is also guaranteed in the non-uniform traffic pattern.     

Seamless session mobility scheme in heterogeneous wireless networks

The next generation wireless communication system will likely be heterogeneous networks, as various technologies can be integrated on heterogeneous networks. A mobile multiple‐mode device can easily access the Internet through different wireless interfaces. The mobile multiple‐mode device thus could switch to different access points to maintain the robustness of the connection when it can acquire more resources from other heterogeneous wireless networks. The mobile multiple‐mode device therefore needs to face the handover problem in such environment. This work introduces Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)‐based cross‐layer scheme to support seamless handover scheme over heterogeneous networks. The proposed scheme consists of a battery lifetime‐based handover policy and cross‐layer fast handover scheme, called the SIP‐based mobile stream control transmission protocol (SmSCTP). This work describes the major idea of the proposed scheme and infrastructure. The proposed scheme has been implemented in Linux system. The simulation and numerical results demonstrate that the proposed SmSCTP scheme yields better signaling cost, hand‐off delay time, packet loss and delay jitter than SIP and mSCTP protocols. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

QoS handover management for multimedia LEO satellite networks

Low earth orbit (LEO) satellite systems gained considerable interest towards the end of the previous decade by virtue of some of the appealing features that are endowed with, such as low propagation delay and the ability to communicate with handheld terminals. However, after the limited commercial success of the first networks of this kind, future satellite networks are now conceived as complementary rather than competitive to terrestrial networks. In this paper, we focus on one of the most influential factors in system performance, that is, the handover of a call. First, we provide a succinct review of the handover strategies that have been proposed in the literature. Then we propose two different satellite handover techniques for broadband LEO satellite systems that capitalize upon the satellite diversity that a system may provide. The proposed schemes cater for multimedia traffic and are based on the queuing of handover requests. Moreover, a deallocation scheme is also proposed according to which capacity reservation requests are countermanded when the capacity that they strive to reserve is unlikely to be used. Simulation studies further document and confirm the positive characteristics of the proposed handover schemes.     

Hierarchical micro-mobility management in high-speed multihop access networks

1 Introduction A wireless multihop network or Ad-hoc network [1, 2] is a network of independent mobile hosts without any network infrastructure or connection to base stations. In many application areas, however, Internet connectivity and access to service…     

基于卫星时变网络的时延受限最小费用路由算法

卫星网络是一种特殊的时变网络,其QoS路由问题比地面网络QoS路由问题更为复杂.本文利用卫星拓扑的可预测性,通过引入业务的中断概率和费用模型来描述链路切换对业务QoS以及网络的影响,并给出时延受限最小费用路由(SDCMCR)算法来解决在卫星链路时延长的情况下寻找满足时延限制条件且受切换影响最小的路径的问题,该算法可兼顾网络业务中断率和业务阻塞率等性能,且计算复杂度低,可适应星上设备处理能力的要求.仿真表明算法在计算复杂性、业务请求被阻塞的概率等方面都优于同类算法.     

移动卫星网络中基于最小费用的切换算法

对于移动卫星网络,合理的星地链路切换方案需要在保证最小切换时延的同时,能够最优地使用网络资源。该文通过引入业务的中断概率和费用模型,给出了切换过程中重路由的最优触发条件,提出一种基于最小费用的切换(SMCH)算法。该算法可在保证切换业务通信的连续性和时延等指标不被破坏的基础上,通过适当的触发重路由来降低切换费用。仿真表明该算法在保证切换业务的QoS,降低切换费用以及适应性、灵活性等方面都优于同类切换算法。     

An energy-efficient interface selection for multi-mode terminals by utilizing out-of-band paging channels

With the advent of a number of wireless network technologies such as WCDMA and WLAN, current mobiles are equipped with multiple network interfaces, so called Multi-Mode Terminal (MMT). MMTs are capable to access different kinds of networks by performing a vertical handover between heterogeneous wireless networks, where during the idle state, the MMTs consume a lot of energy since their WLAN interface must wake up for listening to periodical beacons. However, previous studies on the vertical handover did not address how to select the optimal interface taking into account the characteristics of MMTs, especially energy consumption. Therefore, in this paper, we propose an energy-efficient interface selection scheme for MMTs in the integrated WLAN and cellular networks. The proposed interface selection scheme takes advantage of existing out-of-band paging channel of cellular networks, so that the WLAN interface can be completely turned off during the idle state leading to reduction in energy consumption. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme outperforms conventional approaches in terms of energy consumption with reduced signaling overhead and handover delay.     

Trust-Assisted Handover Approach in Hybrid Wireless Networks

In Next-Generation (NG) hybrid wireless networks, Mobile-Controlled Handover (MCHO) is expected to be employed as the handover control mechanism, in contrast to Network-Controlled Handover (NCHO) used in homogeneous wireless networks. As more independent network operators get involved in providing Internet access, roaming mobile users would have to deal with complex trust relationships between heterogeneous network domains. The state-of-the-art handover approaches just take into account Quality of Service (QoS), but ignore the complexities arising from the coexistence of multiple network operators in the NG networks. The existence of a complex trust relationship between networks may lead to unnecessary handover attempts in service roaming. In this regard, this paper introduces a novel approach of dynamically retrieving network trust information, and using it in MCHO. We show how network trust information can be utilised to obtain a 35% reduction in handover delay, meanwhile retain QoS in a handover. The proposed scheme does not need bulk storage in mobile handsets, and can react to changes to network topology and trust relationships dynamically. Analytical results are provided to demonstrate how roaming mobile users make more intelligent and reliable handover if implementing the proposed handover approach in a multi-operator and multi-technology environment.     

Fast-Handover Mechanism between 802.11 WLAN and 802.16 WiMax with MIH in PMIPv6

As the wireless Internet services become widely available, users become able to use various Internet services without restriction in location. In particular, the demands on wireless Internet services are becoming greater, because mobile devices that support high mobility are getting smarter. However, if a user uses various wireless networks, much limitation occurs in network setting when they move a network different each other. This is because there are few appropriate handover mechanisms to support a heterogeneous network. We propose a fast-handover for heterogeneous networks that utilizes MIH in PMIPv6 to support heterogeneous networks and to reduce the handover latency time. And the performance evaluation for the proposed method was done separately for low speed and high speed mobility. The result presented shows that the suggested method has reduced latency time by 26 % and packet losses by 90 % (Avg.).     

Network selection in cognitive radio enabled Wireless Body Area Networks

In recent years, the great interest in Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs) has been aroused significantly due to the advancement in wireless communications. In wireless communication, all WBAN nodes that monitor the human body's vital functions transfer information to a central sink node, which is directly connected to a Cognitive Radio enabled Controller called CRC. To transfer this information from a CRC to an e-health server, it requires long-range wireless networks, such as UMTS, LTE, WiMAX, WiFi, and satellite internet provider. It is challenging for a CRC to select the best networks for different WBAN data traffic, such as emergency mandatory, delay sensitive, and general monitoring. This paper proposes a scheme for selecting the best network from the available networks depending on the Quality of Service(QoS) requirements for different WBAN applications. Different multiple attribute decision-making algorithms are used in the proposed scheme. Numerical results and discussion reveal that the proposed scheme is effective in making a good network selection in situations where there is a conflict among different QoS requirements for different WBAN applications.     

A scalable network-based mobility management framework in heterogeneous IP-based networks

This paper proposes a mobility management scheme to provide a mobile node with high-quality handovers among heterogeneous wireless access networks. The proposed scheme employs a signaling architecture to support fast and reliable delivery of control messages by separating a control plane from a data transport plane in the core network. The proposed scheme is based on the network-based mobility management framework which requires the minimum modifications on terminal devices. With interaction between Layers 2 and 3, the proposed scheme accelerates the handover control procedures. It also enables a mobile subscriber to select a target network for a vertical handover with consideration of not only wireless signal strength but also user preference and quality-of-service status. The proposed scheme addresses the well-known problems of the Mobile IP-based approaches, triangular routing and bottleneck at the home agent, since it establishes a data tunnel for a mobile node along the shortest path between two different access networks. The simulation and experimental results indicate that our scheme provisions more efficient performance than the existing approaches in terms of handover latency, data packet loss, data delivery latency and load balancing.     

一种适用于星地网络的流量负载均衡算法

在星地网络的背景下,为了降低由于地面网络链路负载过高导致的传播时延,提出了一种适用于星地网络的负载均衡算法。算法基于网络的链路容量设置一个链路资源利用率作为阈值,当发现路径出现过载的时候分成两步进行路径的预规划：第一步,运用蚁群算法为链路过载的数据流选择其他的路径,以满足地面网内部的负载均衡;第二步,如果仍出现链路超阈值的情况,通过卸载延迟容忍数据流来执行地面与卫星网络之间的负载均衡。仿真结果表明,设定自适应的过载阈值可以有效降低链路的拥塞,与现有算法相比该算法不仅可以更加均匀地分配地面网络中的流量,而且借助卫星网络使地面网络的平均时延降低了18.3%,提高了网络的服务质量。     

一种基于WTLS的轻型移动VPN方案

各种传统的远程访问VPN方案(包括IPSec-VPN和SSL-VPN)都只是为固网环境下外出企业员工的"游牧访问"而设计的,它不适合于未来的移动无线网络场景.本文针对移动无线场景中特有的无线终端计算能力和网络带宽限制等问题,提出了一种基于WTLS安全协议的轻型移动VPN方案.该移动VPN方案支持移动节点在不同无线接入网络之间的自由切换,允许外出企业员工在任何时间、任何地点、使用最佳的无线接入网络连接到企业网络并安全地访问企业内部资源.     

低中轨道双层卫星光网络的分时切换半实物仿真演示系统

为精确模拟验证低中轨道（LEO／MEO）双层卫星光网络及其关键技术,按1：30的比例设计了分时切换双层卫星光网络半实物实验演示系统。系统包括计算机仿真环境和硬件平台两部分,通过SITL模块互联而成。软件部分由虚拟网络组成,实现灵活、可扩展的配置;硬件平台由1个圆形往复转台、6个伺服机构、6个无线激光通信终端和6组自动追...     

QoS Handover Management in LEO/MEO Satellite Systems

Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite networks are foreseen to complement terrestrial networks in future global mobile networks. Although space segment topology of a LEO network is characterized by periodic variations, connections of mobile stations (MSs) to the satellite backbone network alter stochastically. As a result the quality of service delivered to users may degrade. Different procedures have been proposed either as part of a resource allocation mechanism or as part of an end-to-end routing protocol to manage transitions of MSs from one satellite to another (handover). All of these techniques are based on the prioritization of requested handovers to ease network operation and therefore enhance provision of service. This paper proposes a new handover procedure that exploits all geometric characteristics of a satellite-to-MS connection to provide an equable handover in systems incorporating onboard processing satellites. Its performance is evaluated by simulations for a variety of satellite constellations to prove its general applicability. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.