An Efficient Mechanism for UMTS Multicast Routing

In this paper, we present a novel scheme for the multicast transmission of data over Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) networks. Apart from the normal multicast transmission over UMTS, we consider the handling of exceptional cases caused by user mobility scenarios. The proposed scheme is in accordance with the current specifications of the Multimedia Multicast/Broadcast Service (MBMS) defined by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) and introduces minor modifications in the UMTS architecture and the mobility management mechanisms. The proposed scheme is implemented as an ns-2 network simulator module. The performance of the proposed scheme is validated and analyzed through ns-2 simulation experiments. This new module can be employed to investigate various aspects of UMTS multicast. Furthermore, in order to further highlight the contribution of our mechanism, we have implemented two multicast congestion control mechanisms for UMTS and we have measured their performance for MBMS transmissions.     

The multimedia broadcast/multicast service

This article provides an overview of the multimedia broadcast/multicast service (MBMS) for universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) networks. We first outline the features of UMTS networks as defined by the 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP) in order to provide a background for the discussion to follow. We then present the overall MBMS architecture, the services that it provides to the users and the differences between the broadcast and multicast options. The implementation details of MBMS are explained in terms of the modifications needed to the network, the new signaling procedures required and the impact of MBMS on the radio part of the network. We then describe how the security architecture of UMTS is used to support content protection and key distribution for MBMS groups. We evaluate the prospects of MBMS by comparing it first with IP multicast and then with DVB‐H, considered by many to be the closest competitor of MBMS. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of the technical and business challenges still faced by MBMS. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Application layer forward error correction for multicast streaming over LTE networks

The next step beyond third generation mobile networks is the Third Generation Partnership Project standard, named Long Term Evolution. A key feature of Long Term Evolution is the enhancement of multimedia broadcast and multicast services (MBMS), where the same content is transmitted to multiple users located in a specific service area. To support efficient download and streaming delivery, the Third Generation Partnership Project included an application layer forward error correction (AL‐FEC) technique based on the systematic fountain Raptor code, in the MBMS standard. To achieve protection against packet losses, Raptor codes introduce redundant packets to the transmission, that is, the forward error correction overhead. In this work, we investigate the application of AL‐FEC over MBMS streaming services. We consider the benefits of AL‐FEC for a continuous multimedia stream transmission to multiple users and we examine how the amount of forward error correction redundancy can be adjusted under different packet loss conditions. For this purpose, we present a variety of realistic simulation scenarios for the application of AL‐FEC and furthermore we provide an in‐depth analysis of Raptor codes performance introducing valuable suggestions to achieve efficient use of Raptor codes. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multicast in UMTS: evaluation and recommendations

It is known that multicasting is an efficient method of supporting group communication as it allows the transmission of packets to multiple destinations using fewer network resources. Along with the widespread deployment of the third generation cellular networks, the fast‐improving capabilities of the mobile devices, content and service providers are increasingly interested in supporting multicast communications over wireless networks and in particular over Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). Multicasting is a more efficient method of supporting group communication than unicasting or broadcasting, as it allows transmission and routing of packets to multiple destinations using fewer network resources. In this paper, the three above mentioned methods of supporting group communication are analyzed in terms of their performance. The critical parameters of primary interest for the evaluation of any method are the packet delivery cost and the scalability of the method. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effective Radio Resource Management for MBMS in UMTS Networks

Broadcast and multicast offer a significant improvement of spectrum utilization, and becomes particularly important where information channels are shared among several users. Mobile cellular environments are expected to evolve with the technological approaches necessary to facilitate the deployment of multimedia services, such as streaming, file download and carousel services. The perspective that video streaming in wireless networks services is an attractive service to end-users has spurred the research in this area. To provide for a video delivery platform in UMTS, the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) addressed this problem with the introduction of the Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Services (MBMS) in 3GPP Release 6. In this document we analyse several effective radio resource management techniques to provide MBMS, namely, use of non-uniform QAM constellations, multi-code and macro-diversity to guarantee the optimal distribution of QoS depending on the location of mobiles.     

Embracing RaptorQ FEC in 3GPP multicast services

Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Services (MBMS) have been introduced by Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) aiming to efficiently deliver data to mobile users in a one-to-many way. In order to provide reliable multicast transmission, 3GPP recommends exclusively for MBMS the use of a Forward Error Correction (FEC) mechanism on the application layer. Raptor codes are standardized as the Application Layer FEC (AL-FEC) scheme over 3GPP MBMS. However, the 3GPP standardized systematic fountain Raptor code is nowadays considered obsolete, since a new variation of the Raptor codes has emerged. This enhanced AL-FEC scheme, named RaptorQ, promises higher protection efficiency and superior flexibility on the provision of demanding mobile multicast services. In this work, we provide an extensive performance evaluation presenting at first a theoretical performance comparison of the newly introduced RaptorQ FEC scheme with its predecessor Raptor code, examining the enhancements that RaptorQ introduces on the AL-FEC protection robustness. Thereafter, to verify the enhanced performance of RaptorQ, we present several simulation results considering the modeling of the AL-FEC protection over multicast services for next generation mobile networks, utilizing the ns-3 simulation environment. Investigating several mobile system parameters in conjunction with FEC encoding parameters, we provide valuable results regarding the impacts of the examined AL-FEC schemes application on the multicast services performance.     

Web browsing optimization over 2.5G and 3G: end‐to‐end mechanisms vs. usage of performance enhancing proxies

2.5 Generation (2.5G) and Third Generation (3G) cellular wireless networks allow mobile Internet access with bearers specifically designed for data communications. However, Internet protocols under‐utilize wireless wide area network (WWAN) link resources, mainly due to large round trip times (RTTs) and request‐‐reply protocol patterns. Web browsing is a popular service that suffers significant performance degradation over 2.5G and 3G. In this paper, we review and compare the two main approaches for improving web browsing performance over wireless links: (i) using adequate end‐to‐end parameters and mechanisms and (ii) interposing a performance enhancing proxy (PEP) between the wireless and wired parts. We conclude that PEPs are currently the only feasible way for significantly optimizing web browsing behavior over 2.5G and 3G. In addition, we evaluate the two main current commercial PEPs over live general packet radio service (GPRS) and universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) networks. The results show that PEPs can lead to near‐ideal web browsing performance in certain scenarios. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A study of multicast congestion control for UMTS

In this paper, we study the applicability of multicast congestion control over universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) networks. We analyze two well‐known multicast congestion control schemes for fixed networks, namely TCP‐friendly multicast congestion control and pragmatic general multicast congestion control. We investigate their behavior when they are employed in UMTS networks and we analyze the problems arose when these mechanisms are applied over the wireless links of the UMTS terrestrial radio‐access network. Additionally, we propose necessary improvements to these legacy schemes and explain the necessity of these modifications. The proposed schemes are implemented in the ns‐2 network simulator and are evaluated under various network conditions and topologies. Finally, we measure the performance of the proposed modified schemes and compare them with the corresponding legacy mechanisms. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An improved mechanism for multiple MBMS sessions assignment in B3G cellular networks

In Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), the downlink capacity is limited by the base station transmission power. Therefore, power control plays an important role to minimize the transmitted power shared among unicast and multicast users within a cell. In Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Service (MBMS), power control targets to the efficient utilization of radio and network resources. However, the expected high demand for such services stresses the need for an efficient scheme, capable of dynamically allocating radio resources to parallel MBMS sessions. This paper proposes a power control mechanism for efficient MBMS session assignment in next generation UMTS networks. The mechanism shares efficiently the available power resources of UMTS base stations to MBMS sessions running in the network. Furthermore, the mechanism is evaluated through several realistic scenarios and the results indicate the ability of the mechanism to utilize efficiently the radio resources and to ensure the service continuity when parallel MBMS services run in the network. Our approach is compared with current 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) approaches, such as these presented in TS 25.346 and in TR 25.922, in order to highlight the enhancements that it provides.     

Support of multiple content variants in the multimedia broadcast/multicast service

The Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Service (MBMS) was designed to enable the mass distribution of multimedia content in 3rd Generation and beyond cellular networks. If such services are to become commercially viable, they must be able to efficiently support widely heterogeneous user requirements, for example, due to terminal limitations and cost constraints. This paper presents an MBMS extension that allows multiple variants of the same content to be economically distributed to heterogeneous receivers, explicitly taking into account the possibility of using either dedicated or common radio channels. We describe our extended multiple content variant MBMS model by explaining the modifications that it imposes on the standard MBMS model, as well as the manner in which it can be combined with layered coding. We also present an analytical evaluation of our approach against alternatives based on the standard MBMS in terms of control and user plane overhead, and compare the analytical predictions with detailed simulation results. Both the analysis and the simulations indicate that our proposal can indeed satisfy heterogeneous user requirements, while consuming considerably lower resources than the standard‐based alternatives. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hopfield neural‐network‐based dynamic resource allocation scheme for non‐real‐time traffic in wireless networks

Dynamic resource allocation (DRA) plays a fundamental role in current and future wireless networks, including 3G systems. In this paper, a scheduling DRA scheme for non‐real‐time (NRT) packet services in wireless system is proposed based on the use of Hopfield neural networks (HNN). The scheme exploits the fast response time of HNN for solving NP optimization problems and has been particularized for the downlink transmission in a UMTS system, although it could be easily extended to any other radio access technology. The new DRA scheme follows a delay‐centric approach, since it maximizes the overall system resource utilization while minimizing the packet delay. Simulation results confirm that the proposed HNN‐based DRA scheme is effective in supporting different types of NRT services, while achieving efficient utilization of radio resources. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A multicast mechanism for UMTS

This article aims to investigate multicast deployment issues and requirements in the context of UMTS networks. We propose a multicast mechanism that supports resource-efficient multicast packet delivery. The proposed scheme allows multicast packets to be transferred in an optimal manner on shared links toward multiple destinations. We describe the mechanisms of the proposed scheme in establishing multicast tunnels within the network and performing group management. We explore the differences between the proposed scheme and the multimedia broadcast/multicast service of the 3GPP, and outline the advantages and disadvantages of both multicast schemes.     

Simplified gateway selection scheme for multihop relay in vehicular ad hoc network

Integrating vehicular ad hoc network (VANET) and universal mobile telecommunication system (UMTS) could be a promising architecture for future machine‐to‐machine applications. This integration can help vehicles have steady Internet connection through the UMTS network and in communicating with other vehicles. However, dead spot areas and unsuccessful handoff processes caused by the high speed of vehicles can disrupt the implementation of this kind of architecture. In this paper, a new simplified gateway selection (SGS) scheme for multihop relay in a VANET‐UMTS integration network is proposed. The proposed scheme extends the coverage or/and calming of the frequent handoff process and allows vehicles to continue to be connected to the UMTS infrastructure network. An integrated simulation environment that combines VanetMobiSim and NS2 is used to simulate and evaluate the proposed scheme. The simulation results show that the SGS scheme performed better when it was implemented with ad hoc on a demand distance vector routing and destination‐sequenced distance vector routing protocols. Furthermore, the SGS scheme is compared with other cluster‐based gateway selections used in the previous works. The results show that our SGS scheme outperforms other cluster‐based gateway selections scheme in terms of selection delay, control packet overhead, packet delivery ratio, and overall throughput. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Seamless Handoff Scheme Based on Pre-registration and Pre-authentication for UMTS–WLAN Interworking

Interworking issues between Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS) and Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) have become a great matter of interest as an increasing number of mobile internet users require broadband wireless access to IP services in the wide area. In this paper, we present a practical UMTS–WLAN interworking architecture based on 3GPP standards and propose a seamless handoff scheme that guarantees low delay and low packet loss during UMTS–WLAN handoff. For low handoff delay, the proposed handoff scheme performs pre-registration and pre-authentication processes before layer 2 handoff. Moreover, it uses packet buffering and forwarding functions in order to reduce packet loss during the handoff period. On the above basis, detailed signaling procedures are presented, together with system requirements when a mobile terminal moves from UMTS to WLAN and vice-versa. Numerical results show that the proposed scheme performs well with respect to signaling cost, handoff delay, and packet loss compared with conventional schemes.     

Scalable rate control for video transmission over UMTS

This paper proposes a mechanism for the congestion control for video transmission over Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). Our scheme is applied when the mobile user experiences real time multimedia content and adopts the theory of a widely accepted rate control method in wired networks, namely equation‐based rate control. In this approach, the transmission rate of the multimedia data is determined as a function of the packet loss rate, the round trip time and the packet size and the server explicitly adjusts its sending rate as a function of these parameters. Through a number of simulations and experiments we validate the correctness and measure the performance and efficiency of the mechanism. A first level of evaluation is carried out using the ns‐2 simulator. A second level then validates the proposed mechanism in real world traffic scenarios by performing experiments in a commercial UMTS network. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adaptive and reliable video transmission over UMTS for enhanced performance

This paper proposes a mechanism for the congestion control for video transmission over universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS). Our scheme is applied when the mobile user experiences real‐time multimedia content and adopts the theory of a widely accepted rate control method in wired networks, namely equation‐based rate control. In this approach, the transmission rate of the multimedia data is determined as a function of the packet loss rate, the round trip time and the packet size and the server explicitly adjusts its sending rate as a function of these parameters. Furthermore, we examine the performance of the UMTS for real‐time video transmission using real‐time protocols. Through a number of experiments, we measure performance parameters such as end‐to‐end delay, delay in radio access network, delay jitter and throughput in the wireless link. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

W-CDMA/UMTS下一种解决TCP有效性和公平性的跨层方案

在UMTS系统中,由于MAC层的包调度引入了用户间的竞争,带来了传输层TCP有效性和公平性问题,为了解决这个问题,该文提出了一种主动ACK包转发控制策略(AAFC),它的基本思想是在基站处嵌入AAFC模块,通过MAC层和传输层之间的消息传递来控制基站处ACK包的转发,以此来保证用户间TCP流的公平性以及链路层无线资源的最充分利用。仿真结果证明了AAFC方案的有效性。     

An Efficient Mechanism for Multicast Data Transmission in UMTS

In this paper, we present an efficient scheme for the multicast transmission of the data in the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). We take advantage of the tree topology of the examined network and we introduce the use of Routing Lists (RLs) in the nodes of the UMTS. The adoption of these lists leads to the decrement of the transmitted packets and to the efficient use of network resources in the multicast transmission of the data. We describe in detail the appropriate steps for the successful multicast transfer of data. Furthermore, we analyze the handling of special cases such as user mobility scenarios. Especially, the various handover types are examined along with the Serving Radio Network Subsystem relocation procedure. Finally, we implement our approach in the NS-2 simulator and we present the performance of the multicast mechanism.     

Dynamic region‐based mobile multicast

Traditional mobile multicast schemes have higher multicast tree reconfiguration cost or multicast packet delivery cost. Two costs are very critical because the former affects the service disruption time during handoff while the latter affects the packet delivery delay. Although the range‐based mobile multicast (RBMoM) scheme and its similar schemes offer the trade‐off between two costs to some extent, most of them do not determine the size of service region, which is critical to the network performance. Hence, we propose a dynamic region‐based mobile multicast (DRBMoM) to dynamically determine the optimal service region for reducing the multicast tree reconfiguration and multicast packet delivery costs. DRBMoM provides two versions: (i) the per‐user version, named DRBMoM‐U, and (ii) the aggregate‐users version, named DRBMoM‐A. Two versions have different applicability, which are the complementary technologies for pursuing efficient mobile multicast. Though having different data information and operations, two versions have the same method for finding the optimal service region. To that aim, DRBMoM models the users' mobility with arbitrary movement directional probabilities in 2‐D mesh network using Markov Chain, and predicts the behaviors of foreign agents' (FAs') joining in a multicast group. DRBMoM derives a cost function to formulate the average multicast tree reconfiguration cost and the average multicast packet delivery cost, which is a function of service region. DRBMoM finds the optimal service region that can minimize the cost function. The simulation tests some key parameters of DRBMoM. In addition, the simulation and numerical analyses show the cost in DRBMoM is about 22∼50% of that in RBMoM. At last, the applicability and computational complexity of DRBMoM and its similar scheme are analyzed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.