TCP Level Investigation of Parallel Transmission over Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

Communication networks beyond 3G will see the interconnection of heterogeneous radio access networks in order to always provide the best quality of service in the most efficient way to users with multi-mode terminals. This scenario poses a number of critical issues, which have to be faced in order to get the best from the integrated network. In this paper we investigate the issue of parallel transmission over multiple radio access networks: in particular we propose simple but effective radio resource management algorithms, whose performance is investigated by means of a simulative approach in UMTS-IEEE802.11a and IEEE802.16e-IEEE802.11a heterogeneous networks (adopted as case studies). An insight on TCP level critical aspects, strictly related to the parallel transmission over multiple access networks, is also provided.