A network-based fast handover scheme over IEEE 802.16e access networks

A broadband wireless access (BWA) networks, which is the networks defined in the IEEE 802.16e standard for wireless metropolitan access networks (WMAN), provides multimedia service to fixed and mobile nodes using wireless interfaces. When a node moves from one access network to another network, it needs a network-layer handover technoloty to maintain ongoing sessions. And a cross-layer design enables to optimize, fast handover over specific access networks. In this paper, we proposed a fast PMIP-6 scheme with two link-layer and two network-layer messages, newly defined for IP continuity over the IEEE 802.16e access networks to reduce handover latency and alleviate packet loss. Also, we evaluated the performance of our scheme compared with the PMIPv6 and the FPMIPv6.