RAMP: reconfigurable architecture and mobility platform

Abstract

There are many incompatible wireless systems. How to integrate them has become an important issue. The integration should be done in both radio access networks (RANs) and core networks. The current trend is to integrate various RANs with an IP-based core network so users with a multi-mode handset or reconfigurable radio, such as software defined radio (SDR), could seamlessly roam among different RANs. With this all-IP paradigm, there should be one common core network, or various core networks should be compatible. Unfortunately, although both 3GPP and 3GPP2 have adopted IP in their packet-switched core networks, the architectures and protocols are not necessary compatible. In addition, they are also different from today's Internet. A user with reconfigurable radio still could not roam seamlessly among 3GPP, 3GPP2, and other IP core networks. As that in RANs, in this paper we propose a reconfigurable architecture in which users could use different protocols in core networks dynamically. There are many potential research topics for the reconfigurable core network. This paper focuses on reconfigurable mobility management. An architecture called reconfigurable architecture and mobility platform (RAMP) is proposed. Both analytical model and simulation are developed to analyze the architecture. In addition, a testbed is constructed. Empirical experiments are conducted to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed idea