Toward edge-based caching in software-defined heterogeneous vehicular networks

Abstract

Considerable technological advancements and pervasive use of smart connected vehicles have highlighted the true potential of vehicular networks, which, in the realm of smart cities, assists in improvement of road safety and traffic management and efficiency. Coupled with this is the massive innovation realized in wireless networking technologies, and today, heterogeneous networks encompassing 4G LTE, Wi-Fi, WiMAX, DSRC, and Terahertz communication are taking shape, synergy of which not only promises higher bandwidth but also ensures low latent infrastructure critical for supporting diverse range of safety applications. Heterogeneity, on the other hand, has introduced new challenges too, e.g., in terms of network fragmentation, an unbalanced traffic flow in a multi-path topology, and inefficient utilization of network resources. Accordingly, the emerging yet promising paradigm of software-defined networking (SDN) has, of lately, been introduced to vehicular networks for addressing such bottlenecks, which through its logically centralized control ensures programmability, scalability, elasticity, and agility. Nevertheless, a centralized control in a distributed environment like vehicular networks could become a single point of network failure and may also result in significant network management overhead in case of extremely dense traffic scenarios. Therefore, leveraging edge-based caching in heterogeneous vehicular networks is indispensable. This chapter brings forward the notion of SDN-based heterogeneous vehicular networking and argues that edge-based caching can help overcome the bottlenecks posed by traditional networking architectures especially in terms of ensuring low latency for safety-critical applications. Finally, open challenges and probable solutions are discussed.