QoS Handover Management in LEO/MEO Satellite Systems

Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite networks are foreseen to complement terrestrial networks in future global mobile networks. Although space segment topology of a LEO network is characterized by periodic variations, connections of mobile stations (MS’s) to the satellite backbone network alter stochastically. As a result the quality of service delivered to users may degrade. Different procedures have been proposed either as part of a resource allocation mechanism or as part of an end-to-end routing protocol to manage transitions of MS’s from one satellite to another (handover). All of these techniques are based on the prioritization of requested handovers to ease network operation and therefore enhance provision of service. This paper proposes a new handover procedure that exploits all geometric characteristics of a satellite-to-MS connection to provide an equable handover in systems incorporating onboard processing satellites. Its performance is evaluated by simulations for a variety of satellite constellations to prove its general applicability.