Mobility management in next generation wireless metropolitan area networks:Master's thesis

The next generation of wireless access technologies cannot succeed by providing either high data rates or full mobility support. Instead, it will be required to provide both broadband connectivity and support for full mobility. Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) and High Speed Packet Access (HSPA) are two upcoming technologies, which can live up to these high expectations. In this master's thesis, WiMAX and HSPA are reviewed, paying special attention to mobility management issues and support for modern mixed multimedia traffic. In order to observe the real performance of currently available commercial equipment under such traffic conditions, measurement results from a WiMAX testbed are provided. These results show that even with rudimentary fixed WiMAX equipment, the effective capacity of the wireless link is substantially higher than that of the wireless access technologies currently dominating the markets. Wireless access technologies often need assistance from network layer protocols, in order to deliver full mobility support at the system level. In WiMAX, the Mobile Internet Protocol (MIP) is used for network layer mobility management. This master's thesis overviews different MIP variants, including the Mobile Internet Protocol Version 6 (MIPv6), which is reviewed in detail. The handover latencies of the MIPv6 are also studied using a testbed. The measurement results show that in order for the MIPv6 to handle network layer mobility management in a satisfactory manner, all the wireless networks involved in a handover must be carefully configured