Handover-Supporting Streamlined Networking

Abstract

When a mobile station (MS) performs handover among base stations or femtocells, data streaming services are likely to be disrupted due to connectivity reset or connection transfer. As a remedy, we develop a means to enhance handover by caching users' data such as security contexts or video clips a priori at network sites where the MS is likely to migrate. Each such site with foreknowledge of the user can thus complete handover sooner than would otherwise be possible by bypassing parts of procedures when the MS arrives. Complementary to well-known schemes, our approach extends the use of current cache model to allow for recency information and distinct processing delay. By introducing a form of data admission control to prevent low-penalty stations from contending for limited storage space, our approach enables high-penalty stations to experience fewer cache misses. Further, the control is exercised adaptively in light of network dynamics. Moderate cache size is suggested to accommodate sufficient data, so as to trade cache hits for a saving of storage demand. Performance results show that our approach outperforms counterpart schemes generally by over 20% in terms of handover delays. Our development lends itself to emerging 5G telecommunications networks.