Network-aware user association in public safety oriented mobile networks

Abstract

In many disaster scenarios, communication infrastructure fails to provide network services for both civilians and first responders. One solution is to have rapidly deployable mobile networks formed by interconnected base stations, that are easy to move, deploy, and configure. Such public safety-oriented networks are different from classical mobile networks in terms of scale, deployment, and architecture. In this context, we revisit the user association problem, for two main reasons. First, the backhaul, formed by the links interconnecting the base stations, must be accounted for when deciding on the association, since it may present a bottleneck with its limited bandwidth. Second, the mission-critical nature of the traffic imposes strict guaranteed bit rate constraints, that must be respected when associating users. Therefore, we propose a network-aware optimal association that minimizes the bandwidth consumption on the backhaul, while still respecting the stringent performance requirements.