Jul 2026· International Conference on Smart Communications and Networking· pp. 1-6· 0 citations· 16 references
Abstract
The proliferation of applications and multimedia services has led users to demand more bandwidth while limiting access time to the target content. The current 5G specifications provide mechanisms to support these challenging requirements by leveraging both the slicing paradigm, which enables the allocation of network resources with dedicated Quality of Service (QoS), and the Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC), bringing content as close as possible to end users. Two additional key enablers can further improve user experience: the 5G non-3GPP access and the use of Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN). The former could extend the overall coverage by exploiting legacy technologies, largely deployed, such as Wi-Fi, which can also avoid frequency license issues in many cases. The latter represents the most efficient solution to support multicast/broadcast content distribution towards the edges of the network. These key enablers are addressed in the ESA 5G-EMERGE project, where 5G, satellite broadcasting, and a Content Delivery Network (CDN) are integrated to efficiently deliver IP-based multimedia services. In this framework, the contribution of this paper is to describe the innovative reference architecture and technologies proposed in 5G-EMERGE, focusing on the implementation and validation of a non-3GPP edge component compliant with the 5G MEC architecture, leveraging NTN as backbone, interworking with a commercial 5G core network, and providing support for QoS enforcement and multicast delivery. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed solution in terms of both delay reduction and bandwidth optimization.
As the telecommunications industry advances towards the realisation of 6G, ubiquitous global coverage has emerged as a key objective. This has driven significant interest in the integration of terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks (ITNTNs), where satellite systems complement terrestrial infrastructure to enable seamless connectivity. However, the global operational scale of satellite systems necessitates cooperation between Low Earth Orbit satellite operators (LEOPs) and local mobile network operators (MNOs), introducing new economic and operational challenges. At the same time, emerging applications are expected to impose strict quality-of-service (QoS) requirements that must be guaranteed across both domains. This paper proposes a QoS-aware tiered pricing framework for supporting users with diverse QoS requirements in an ITNTN. Users are classified into service classes based on empirical traffic characterisation, with each class assigned a dedicated network slice and a target load level linked to QoS guarantees through a queueing-based latency model. The MNO determines class-specific prices that regulate aggregate demand to match these target loads. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed framework enforces QoS requirements, preserves the desired load hierarchy, and aligns pricing with QoS differentiation, while remaining analytically tractable under heterogeneous user populations.
Simbarashe Tanyanyiwa, O. Falowo· International Conference on...· 0 citations
— The increase in mobile data traffic in Fifth-Generation (5G) networks means that new handover management and content delivery solutions are needed to keep the network running smoothly and the user experience high. This paper introduces an innovative integration of Named Data Networking (NDN) into the 5G architecture, incorporating an Enhanced Popularity-Based Caching mechanism at the Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) layer of the 5G user plane. Our design is different from previous ones because it changes how content is replicated based on how mobile and dense the User Equipment (UE) and gNB are in real time. Using Python-based models, we ran a lot of simulations to compare baseline 5G, edge-caching, and full NDN configurations. The proposed solution had a Handover Success Rate (HSR) of over 90%, a Cache Hit RAtio (CHR) of between 78% and 80%, an average latency of about 20 ms, and a packet loss rate of less than 1.0% across a wide range of network scenarios. The NDN integrated architecture cuts latency by up to 35%, boosts throughput by 40%, makes fallback efficiency improved by 36.8%, and raises average HSR by 25 – 40%. All of these changes improve the Quality of Experience (QoE) in environments with a lot of movement. The research we conduct aims to facilitate seamless, scalable, and resilient content delivery for next-generation 5G edge networks.
Ade Nurhayati· Journal of Communications· 0 citations
The integrated satellite-terrestrial networks (STNs) aim to provide ubiquitous connectivity and support various services with diverse requirements. Each service request has to go through a sequence of virtual network functions (VNFs) that should be mapped on its routing path. The STNs are equipped with limited communication and computation resources, making it challenging to enable heterogeneous services. Furthermore, the movement of satellites causes frequent changes in topology, which can impact the continuity of long-lasting requests. For requests lasting multiple time frames, the VNF mapping update and path recomputation at the beginning of each time frame is computationally expensive and can cause unwanted service interruptions. Therefore, we propose a selective handover strategy where the path recomputation and VNF remapping are done only if there is a change in the previous routing path. The selective handover strategy ensures that only critical handovers are carried out while discouraging unnecessary reconfigurations, which result in service discontinuity. We develop a software-defined networking (SDN) based experimental testbed that allows us to realistically consider the system constraints. The VNF mapping and path computation for a request are done in a proactive manner, and the rate meters are installed on the switches according to the current network traffic to efficiently utilize the available bandwidth. The simulation results certify that the proposed strategy reduces the packet loss by up to 11.5% and 18.5% as compared to the benchmark schemes and provides stable throughput for eMBB services with minimal service-level agreement (SLA) violations, while also ensuring the latency requirements of mMTC.
Muhammad Ahsan, T. Vu, Ilora Maity et al.· International Mediterranean...· 0 citations
Space-air-ground integrated networks (SAGINs) offer seamless three-dimensional coverage and strengthened flexibility, which are recognized as a core network architecture of 6G. Software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) are two enabling technologies for SAGINs that can be utilized to sequentially arrange virtual network functions (VNFs) into service function chains (SFCs) to provide users with resource-efficient and delay-optimized multi-source multicast request (MMR) services. However, SAGINs exhibit significant dynamism and heterogeneity, it brings great challenges when dynamically deploying the MMR’s source nodes and SFCs for fulfilling MMR routing. This paper investigates the multi-source multicast SFC embedding problem (MMSEP) considering the determination of the source nodes for MMR, VNFs placement, as well as network resources and delay constraints in the SDN/NFV-enabled SAGIN. Firstly, we define and formulate the MMSEP and demonstrate its NP-hardness. Subsequently, we employ a heuristic algorithm to assign the optimal source nodes for all multicast destination nodes and utilize the markov decision process (MDP) to simulate dynamic transitions in network states. Finally, we propose a deep deterministic policy gradient with attention mechanism (DDPG-AM) to address the MMSEP, aiming to minimize resource consumption costs and delays while maximizing the revenue of the internet service provider. The simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm surpasses the state-of-the-art DDPG algorithm by approximately 27% in network utility, 17% in latency reduction, and 5% in acceptance ratio.
Liang Liu, Yejun He, Yujie Zhang et al.· IEEE Transactions on Network...· 0 citations
The development of immersive video service and large-scale cluster computing technology further expand the potential application scope of time-sensitive networks (TSN). In the delivery network for these emerging services, Ultra-Service Flows (USFs), characterized by ultra-high bandwidth and deterministic latency, have become the most representative traffic type. Therefore, the route scheduling for hybrid deployment of Regular-Service Flows (RSFs) and USF has become an unavoidable issue within a deterministic domain. However, existing research has not thoroughly investigated routing issues for the hybrid deployment of USF and RSF since the significant differences between them. To resolve this issue, a multi-objective optimization model is designed in this paper, in which three key factors are comprehensively considered: the path blocking degree of USF, the available bandwidth rate, and the end-to-end latency of RSF. Subsequently, we propose a cooperative framework where a Transformer-DRL agent, enforced by validity-constraint masking, generates high-quality initial populations to “warm start” NSGA-II. This hybrid design replaces random initialization, effectively resolving the evolutionary “cold start” issue in large-scale topologies while ensuring routing feasibility. The simulation results demonstrate that the algorithm proposed here in significantly improves performance and generalization capabilities, improving the RSF’s overall latency, the USF’s path-blocking degree, and the available bandwidth rate by 10.526%, 14.102%, and 14.286%, respectively.
Mengjie Guo, Qiang Wu, Ran Wang et al.· IEEE Transactions on Network...· 0 citations
Simulation results demonstrate that the IRFO-JORA algorithm could efficiently allocate resource according to system parameters and user QoE requirements, thereby significantly improving RF utilization efficiency.