Smart gateway diversity techniques and transport-layer issues for future satellite networks

Next-generation satellite networks will build on smart gateway diversity (SGD) architectures based on the large capacity offered by high-frequency bands (Q, V, and W) in order to achieve very high system availability figures (greater than 99%). Despite the numerous studies about system design, little literature has explored the networking problems arising when switching traffic flows from one gateway, subject to feeder link outage, to an alternate one. In this regard, particularly promising multi-path strategies are represented by multi-path transmission control protocol (MP-TCP) and concurrent multipath transfer-stream control transmission protocol, which are the main aim of this paper along with the management of quality of service (QoS) requirements. This work shows the attractive advantages offered by MP-TCP in various operative SGD scenarios and also explores how multi-path strategies can be efficiently combined with QoS-based scheduling strategies.