Reliable SDN Controller Architecture for Integrated Satellite-Terrestrial Network Convergence: A Review

The current 5G era has met expectations for high data rates and low latency, yet falls short in delivering resilient and ubiquitous connectivity. The terrestrial 5G technology, while successful in some aspects, faces challenges due to congestion and limited capacity in emerging applications, as well as geographical limitations and poor ROI. To combat these issues, integrating satellite technology into terrestrial networks has emerged as a solution. However, the cooperative utilisation of both networks remains a challenge. Diverse research and standardisation efforts propose solutions, notably leveraging Software-Defined Networking (SDN). This paper reviews existing work in this area and presents conceptual solutions. The proposed concept targets reliable convergence, achieving access network selection and traffic steering for end-to-end data transmission.