Efficient 5G edge caching over satellite

The fifth generation (5G) wireless networks have to deal with the high data rate and stringent latency requirements due to the massive invasion of connected devices and data-hungry applications. Edge caching is a promising technique to overcome these challenges by prefetching the content closer to the end users at the edge node's local storage. In this paper, we analyze the performance of edge caching 5G networks with the aid of satellite communication systems. Firstly, we investigate the satellite-aided edge caching systems in two promising use cases: a) in dense urban areas, and b) in sparsely populated regions, e.g., rural areas. Secondly, we study the effectiveness of satellite systems via the proposed satellite-aided caching algorithm, which can be used in three configurations: i) mono-beam satellite, ii) multi-beam satellite, and iii) hybrid mode. Thirdly, the proposed caching algorithm is evaluated by using both empirical Zipf-distribution data and the more realistic Movielens dataset. We show via numerical results that for the considered popularity data the multi-beam satellite will surpass the mono-beam system when the demands are less correlated, and that the hybrid achieves a cache hit ratio (CHR) between the multi-beam and mono-beam schemes.