Mobility-aware design of cognitive radio networks: Challenges and opportunities

This work deals with mobility-related issues in cognitive radio network design. With few notable exceptions, research activity on cognitive radio networks focused until now on the case of static networks, neglecting to take into account the impact of mobility on network design. In this work the key issues posed by mobility at the different layers of the protocol stack are discussed, and a case study focusing on routing in cognitive UltraWide Band networks is presented, in order to quantitatively assess the impact of mobility on network performance. Next, existing solutions for mobility management in cognitive networks are reviewed, and open issues and future research lines for mobiler cognitive network design are identified. The analysis leads to the conclusion that mobility-related issues should be addressed from a network-wide point of view, taking advantage of terminal cooperation at the local and global level in order to effectively manage mobility in cognitive networks.