Evolutionary coalitional games in network selection

The widespread use of heterogeneous wireless technologies, their integration, advent of multi-mode terminals, and the envisioned user (service) centricity enable users to get associated with the best available networks according to user preferences and application specific requirements. When it comes to user-centric network selection, operators with the view to increasing their user-pool may offer different incentives to the users to motivate them form coalitions. In this paper, we present a novel approach of coalition network selection. We use evolutionary game-theory to model this problem. We also examine fully distributed algorithms for global optima in network selection games. Then, the problem of dynamic network formation and evolutionary coalitional games in network selection networks are investigated. This article also points out the open research issues, new interests and developments in this interdisciplinary field.