VARIOUS TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT METHODS FOR DYNAMIC MULTI-HOP BACKHAULING CELLULAR NETWORK AND SYSTEMS USEFUL IN CONJUNCTION THEREWITH

• US 20130336199A1
• Filed: 11/23/2011
• Published: 12/19/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 11/24/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ELTA Systems Limited (Government of Israel)
• Original Assignee: ELTA Systems Limited (Government of Israel)
• Inventors: Shoshan, Yaakov, Koifman, Gil, Schwartz, Adi
• Granted Patent: US 10,285,208 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/315
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/15507 Relay station based processing for cell extension or control of coverage area, network planning with network coordinated processing with regard to cell extension H04W16/26; network topologies using dedicated repeater stations H04W84/047; terminal devices adapted for relaying to or from an other terminal H04W88/04
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 16/26 Cell enhancers or enhancement, e.g. for tunnels, building shadow
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0268 using specific QoS parameters for wireless networks, e.g. QoS class identifier [QCI] or guaranteed bit rate [GBR] negotiating SLA or negotiating QoS H04W28/24
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/24 Negotiating SLA [Service Level Agreement]; Negotiating QoS [Quality of Service]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/22 for handling the traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/20 Control channels or signalling for resource management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/542 using measured or perceived quality
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/12 Setup of transport tunnels
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/047 using dedicated repeater stations

Abstract

In a mobile communication system including a network having at least one base station operative to receive information in resource allocation terminology understandable to the base station and to allocate downlink bandwidth accordingly, at least one relay operative to convey to the base station information regarding needs of mobile communicators associated with the relay, using the resource allocation terminology understandable to the base station, and when receiving uplink bandwidth, from the base station, which generates an uplink between itself and the base station, to distribute the uplink bandwidth between the mobile communicators associated with the relay.

Claims

1-91. -91. (canceled)

92. A system for use in a mobile communication system including a network having at least one base station operative to receive resource allocation requests and to allocate uplink bandwidth accordingly:

at least one mobile relay apparatus having means providing base station and mobile station functionalities which manage QoS using respective first and second QoS management parameters and being operative;

to convey to the base station a resource allocation request regarding bandwidth needs, in uplink, of mobile communicators associated with the relay, and

when receiving uplink bandwidth, from the base station which generates an uplink between the relay station and the base station, to distribute the uplink bandwidth between the mobile communicators associated with the relay, and

wherein said needs are expressed at service\application requirement level.

93. The system according to claim 92, wherein the request comprises quality of service information characterizing service to be provided to the mobile communicators and wherein distribution of the uplink bandwidth between the mobile communicators associated with the relay is prioritized based on relative quality of service to be provided to the mobile communicators.

94. The system according to claim 92,

wherein said mobile relay apparatus comprises at least one mobile relay served by the base station which is operative to logically combine limitations of mobile communicators served by the relay and to distribute an allocation between downlinks to the mobile communicators served by the relay, according to at least one allocation limitation regarding at least one of minimal bandwidth, quantization of bandwidth, minimal error rate, user error rate requirements, delay requirements and jitter requirements.

95. The system according to claim 94, wherein at least one limitation pertains to type of user manning the mobile communicator.

96. The system according to claim 95, wherein said limitation ascribes greater importance to voice than to data.

97. The system according to claim 92,

wherein said mobile relay apparatus comprises a first relay connected to the base station via a chain of at least one uplink, the first relay being operative to serve a plurality of sons including at least one of another relay and a mobile communicator, the first relay being operative to allocate its uplink bandwidth between the sons by repeatedly receiving dynamic information regarding the available bandwidths of the uplinks in the chain and to compute its uplink bandwidth as the minimum of the available bandwidths.

98. The system according to claim 92, wherein the resource allocation request refers to at least one bearer defined by a cellular telephone protocol to characterize a communication channel.

99. The system according to claim 92,

wherein said mobile relay apparatus comprises at least one mobile relay served by the base station and operative to serve a plurality of descendant nodes including at least one of an additional relay and a mobile communicator node, wherein the relay is operative to receive descendant bandwidth requests from the plurality of descendant nodes, to combine the descendant bandwidth requests into a single bandwidth request and to convey the single bandwidth request to the base station,

and wherein Load balancing management means is provided which uses a topology graph in a Relay server, said means including:

controlling measurement and Load reports and potential links to flow through an active route to the Relay server;

using the measurement and the links by the relay server to build a map comprising a topology graph in case of an overload indication, and/or in a periodic procedure;

combination and merging of the load and measurement reports with the topology graph into a graph;

processing of the graph including indicating handovers, both of end units and of relay, that fix the overload, and

wherein a Handover controller controls handovers of various Relay Apparatus and mobile communication devices (SMs).

100. The system according to claim 99, wherein the relay combines the descendant bandwidth requests into a single bandwidth request so as to take into account which type of user, such as mobile communicators as opposed to means providing mobile-station-functionality at the relay, generated each descendant bandwidth request.

101. The system according to claim 99, wherein said relay combines the descendant bandwidth requests into a single bandwidth request so as to take into account which type of application characterizes the user which generated each descendant bandwidth request.

102. The system according to claim 97, wherein said hierarchical network comprises a network operable according to at least one of the following standards:

2G, 3G, LTE, WiFi, WiMax.

103. The system according to claim 92, and also comprising base station apparatus comprising:

a base station serving nodes in an LTE communication network, the base station apparatus comprising external-to-the-base-station handover commanding functionality operative to issue a command for a handover of at least one Relay node to another base-station.

111. The system according to claim 92 wherein QOS management is performed by chaining bearers.

113. The apparatus according to claim 92, wherein the mobile relay includes a translation table operative for translating one of the QoS management parameters into another one of the QoS management parameters.

115. The system according to claim 94 wherein at least one limitation pertains to minimal delay and wherein bandwidth suffering from a delay greater than the minimal delay cannot be used by the mobile communicator, and

wherein the relay is operative to drop messages whose delay exceeds said minimal delay.

104. A communication system comprising:

a multihop cellular network including base stations and relays having means providing mobile station functionality and operable to manage quality-of-service (QOS) of at least one of the network'"'"'s mobile stations,

wherein at least one of said relays comprises a mobile cellular communication network node operative to;

serve, including communicating via antennae, at least one of the mobile stations or other relays, and

to be served by at least one of the base stations or other relays,

the node including;

a first radio manager,

mobile communicator means which communicates via antennae with at least one selectable base station; and

base station means which has a physical back-connection to the first radio manager,

the first radio manager having a physical connection with the mobile communicator means,

wherein for at least one of said relays, a backhauling link of the relay is operative to manage QoS in order to support the QoS of at least one of the network'"'"'s mobile stations.

105. The system according to claim 104, wherein said network is operable to manage the QOS of at least one of the network'"'"'s nodes.

106. The system according to claim 104, wherein said QOS management is performed by chaining bearers.

107. The system according to claim 104, wherein said network has a topology and wherein QOS management is performed by using initiated handovers to change the network topology.

112. The system according to claim 104 wherein the first radio manager comprises:

a radio resource manager; and

functionality for receiving information from, and sending information to, other radio managers, respectively co-located with other relays, and for using the information to determine whether to reject at least one mobile communicator seeking to be served by an individual base station associated with the individual co-located radio manager.

108. A communication system comprising:

a multihop cellular network using relays having;

means providing mobile station functionality; and

links, and

being operative to perform load-balancing, including balancing of QoS parameters, of at least a subset of the links in said network, by ordering hand-overs,

wherein at least one of said relays comprises a mobile cellular communication network node operative to;

serve, including communicating via antennae, at least one of mobile communicators and other relays, and

to be served by at least one of base stations and other relays,

the node including;

a first radio manager,

mobile communicator functionality which communicates via antennae with at least one selectable base station;

base station functionality which has a physical back-connection to the first radio manager, and

the first radio manager having a physical connection with the mobile communicator functionality.

109. The system according to claim 108, wherein said load-balancing includes load-balancing of the number of users at, at least, a subset of the network'"'"'s links.

110. The system according to claim 108, wherein said load-balancing includes load-balancing of the bandwidth allocation of at least a subset of the network'"'"'s links.

114. The system according to claim 108, wherein the relay comprises a relay server which decides on a handover according to a smart decision procedure which affiliates measurement reports with network traffic statistics, drop statistics, and service requirements, where intermediate grades, comprising metrics are given for each link and the metrics are sent to an optimizer that orders handover if deemed needed.

116. The system according to claim 108, wherein measurement reports regarding a base station are sent by a mobile communication device to its serving node, combined with network throughput and drop rate statistics, and are used to estimate potential capacity of at least one potential link between a mobile communication device or relay apparatus in the network, and a base station.

117. The system according to claim 108, wherein metrics giving an intermediate grade for each link are sent to an optimizer, operative to order handover if needed and comprising:

an algorithm which finds a shortest path from a core to various nodes where measurement reports are used as a weight metric in a linear sum and wherein reports are translated into grades, by using different translation grades to represent each data type and all grades are aggregated into a single scalar.

118. The system according to claim 108, wherein said load balancing combines both centralistic management and local routing management wherein a centralistic manager is operative to compute backhauling quality grade of each network node and to send the quality grade to client relay apparatus and wherein a local routing manager orders a handover if, according to the backhauling quality grade of its neighbors and radio measurement messages, there is a better alternative for the client.

119. The system according to claim 108, wherein said load balancing comprises distributed load balancing in which a backhauling grade, comprising a quality grade of a backhauling link, is exchanged between various relay agents by sending broadcast messages using radio access devices.

120. The system according to claim 108, wherein said load balancing comprises distributed load balancing in which a backhauling grade, comprising a quality grade of a backhauling link, is exchanged between various relay agents by overriding an existing field in a standard.

121. The system according to claim 119, and wherein a local routing manager computes a backhauling quality grade for itself by adding the local routing manager'"'"'s current weight to the quality grade of its backhauling link.