Implications of broadband satellite BoD algorithms on TCP performance

Most next generation satellite systems propose to use a bandwidth on demand (BoD) mechanism to efficiently share a limited radio spectrum among a large number of users. The design of a BoD system needs to consider a range of engineering issues: the anticipated number of users, interactions with other subsystems, and contradictory the design goals of optimising system utilisation and latency offered. The efficiency of a satellite system supporting an TCP/IP service is highly dependent on the delay and the variation of the delay experienced by the TCP transport protocol. This paper therefore investigates transport layer pathologies in BoD satellite networks.