Design and Evaluation of IP Header Compression for Cellular-Controlled P2P Networks

In this paper we advocate to exploit terminal cooperation to stabilize IP communication using header compression. The terminal cooperation is based on direct communication between terminals using short range communication and simultaneously being connected to the cellular service access point. The short range link is than used to provide first aid information to heal the decompressor state of the neighboring node in case of a packet loss on the cellular link. IP header compression schemes are used to increase the spectral and power efficiency loosing robustness of the communication compared to the uncompressed version. By introducing the terminal cooperation supporting header compression the robustness is increased. Within this article we will show that header compression should be applied to reduce the energy consumption of the terminals and moreover the header compression should be supported by cooperation to increase the robustness in terms of a decreased packet loss rate.