The proposal for SDN supported future 5G networks

Abstract

With LTE already in the deployment phase and LTE-A knocking on the door, proposals and research groups for the 5G networks have started to surface. There are no formal specifications or standards for the 5G networks yet. In many recent proposals, people have proposed 5G as a network which provides interoperability among the heterogeneous wireless networks. Continuing this theme, in this paper we propose a Software Defined Network (SDN) supported future 5G network, which provides higher data rates by utilizing the bandwidth of multiple heterogeneous wireless networks simultaneously, and application based adaptive QoS. To achieve these functionalities, we have distributed whole network architecture into three major entities: (1) mobile terminal, (2) radio access network and (3) core network. OpenFlow controller and OpenFlow enabled switches are introduced in all these three entities. This paper presents a detailed description of the modules and functionalities of the OpenFlow controllers present in the proposed 5G network architecture, and communication among these modules to achieve the expected features of 5G networks.