Mobility-Aware Caching and Computation Offloading in 5G Ultra-Dense Cellular Networks

Recent trends show that Internet traffic is increasingly dominated by content, which is accompanied by the exponential growth of traffic. To cope with this phenomena, network caching is introduced to utilize the storage capacity of diverse network devices. In this paper, we first summarize four basic caching placement strategies, i.e., local caching, Device-to-Device (D2D) caching, Small cell Base Station (SBS) caching and Macrocell Base Station (MBS) caching. However, studies show that so far, much of the research has ignored the impact of user mobility. Therefore, taking the effect of the user mobility into consideration, we proposes a joint mobility-aware caching and SBS density placement scheme (MS caching). In addition, differences and relationships between caching and computation offloading are discussed. We present a design of a hybrid computation offloading and support it with experimental results, which demonstrate improved performance in terms of energy cost. Finally, we discuss the design of an incentive mechanism by considering network dynamics, differentiated user’s quality of experience (QoE) and the heterogeneity of mobile terminals in terms of caching and computing capabilities.