A Scalable Solution for Node Mobility Problems in NDN-Based Massive LEO Constellations

TL;DR

The paper tackles producer mobility in ICN/NDN-based, massive LEO constellations by introducing ground gateway-driven mechanisms that locate the appropriate P-Gw and steer Interests toward it via Forwarding Hints, without modifying the NDN protocol. It combines a DNS-like distribution of gateway-prefix mappings with a location-based suffix (OLC) to identify visible satellites and a grid-aware forwarding procedure that minimizes duplications. A complementary consumer-mobility approach reuses retransmission from the old gateway, keeping complexity within gateways and satellites. Simulation results indicate that, for sufficiently long handover periods $H$, traffic losses become negligible and data recovery is robust for both producers and consumers, highlighting practical viability for scalable mobility in dense LEO networks. Overall, the work provides a complete, testable mobility solution that preserves NDN semantics while enhancing resilience in highly dynamic satellite backbones.

Abstract

In recent years, there has been increasing investment in the deployment of massive commercial Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations to provide global Internet connectivity. These constellations, now equipped with inter-satellite links, can serve as low-latency Internet backbones, requiring LEO satellites to act not only as access nodes for ground stations, but also as in-orbit core routers. Due to their high velocity and the resulting frequent handovers of ground gateways, LEO networks highly stress mobility procedures at both the sender and receiver endpoints. On the other hand, a growing trend in networking is the use of technologies based on the Information Centric Networking (ICN) paradigm for servicing IoT networks and sensor networks in general, as its addressing, storage, and security mechanisms are usually a good match for IoT needs. Furthermore, ICN networks possess additional characteristics that are beneficial for the massive LEO scenario. For instance, the mobility of the receiver is helped by the inherent data-forwarding procedures in their architectures. However, the mobility of the senders remains an open problem. This paper proposes a comprehensive solution to the mobility problem for massive LEO constellations using the Named-Data Networking (NDN) architecture, as it is probably the most mature ICN proposal. Our solution includes a scalable method to relate content to ground gateways and a way to address traffic to the gateway that does not require cooperation from the network routing algorithm. Moreover, our solution works without requiring modifications to the actual NDN protocol itself, so it is easy to test and deploy. Our results indicate that, for long enough handover lengths, traffic losses are negligible even for ground stations with just one satellite in sight.

Figures (9)

• Figure S1: Main forwarding elements in an network layer.
• Figure S2: A small constellation with just four orbital planes and eight satellites per plane. The dotted lines show links of blue satellites.
• Figure S3: Logical topology of the constellation represented in Fig. \ref{['fig:constellation-isl-example']} showing the stable links between satellites.
• Figure S4: General overview of the scenario.
• Figure S5: Interest forwarding example.