TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE

IOT

INDEX
Topics
DECLARATION
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
ABSTRACT
LIST OF FIGURES
LIST OF TABLES

List of Contents
CHAPTER-I
Introduction………………………………………………………
CHAPTER-II
LEO Satellite based IOT………………………………….
CHAPTER- III
LEO satellite IOT traffic simulation………………………

Advantages of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite……………...

Disadvantages of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite………….

Examples…………………………………………………………

Conclusion………………………………………………………

References……………………………………………………….

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 TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE
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LIST OF FIGURES

Fig.1.Architecture of LEO Satellite Based LOT System

Fig.2.Static Location Business Model

Fig.3.Traffic Simulation Method Chart

Fig.4.Satellite Terminal visibility Chart

Fig.5.Single Satellite Traffic Change Chart

Fig.6.Three Satellite Traffic Changes in Different Orbital Planes

Fig.7.Three Orbital Planes Total Traffic Changes Chart

Fig.8.Example of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite IOT

LIST OF TABLES

TABLE I - TERRESTRIAL IOT VS LEO SATELLITE BASED

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IOT

ABSTRACT

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a burgeoning paradigm that changes our lives greatly. In many cases, IoT devices are
located in remote areas, which can’t be served by terrestrial access networks. As a consequence, Low Earth Orbit
(LEO) satellite communication system may play an important evolution of 5G, and becomes of paramount importance
for those scenes relying on its disadvantages. Additionally, the first integration of terrestrial communication and
satellite communication in 5G also provides more technical support for the 5G system. Based on the analysis of the
special application scenarios and traffic distribution characteristics of LEO satellite based IoT, this paper describes a
simulation method for the traffic of LEO satellite based IoT. The simulation result shows that the distribution of
business in LEO satellite system has great suddenness and variability both in time and space. Since the non-
uniformity is not conducive to the stability of the system, it is necessary to guide the construction of LEO
satellite based IoTs according to the distribution characteristics and laws of the business. Index Terms—Internet
of Things, 5G, LEO Satellite, Traffic characteristics, Simulation.

The reminder of this paper is organized as follows. Section I describes the development of the IoT and leads to LEO
satellite based IoT. Section II analyzes the characteristics and application scenarios of LEO satellite based IoT. The
third section studies the distribution of LEO satellite based IoT business and simulates them. Finally, Section V
concludes this work and looks forward to the future research directions.

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 TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE
IOT

CHAPTER-I

INTRODUCTION

The remarkable development of Internet of Things in recent years has taken our society one step closer to ubiquitous communication, such as smart
home, intelligent gateway, intelligent society and so on. Although the terrestrial communication is about to enter the 5G era, terrestrial
communication systems are unlikely to achieve global seamless coverage for the constraintsof geographical conditionsand economicdevelopment
level [1]. TakingChina as an example, in remote areas, the extensive coverage of terrestrial networks is still far away; it is very difficult tobuild
terrestrial networksin many places on coastal islands; there arealso noterrestrialnetsinsomeremoteareasofdevelopedareas. Furthermore,inareas
withmajor devastating natural disasters, ground networks are mostly destroyed, and satellite communications may be the only surviving
means of communication. The areas that the terrestrial IoT can’t reach are exactly where satellite communications are going.

The introduction of satellite communication in 5G provides more possibilities for the future IoT applications [2]. Satellite communication is a
realizable and powerful supplement to terrestrial communications and a perfection of the IoT network layer, it can provide a complete and
seamless uninterrupted communication connection to people or things under various environmental conditions. Compared with the traditional
Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO), the LEO has the most important advantages such as low loss, low delay, wide coverage, and large orders of
magnitude [3]. According to [4], 60% terminals are supported by wide-range, low-power, narrowband technology, which can only be implemented
by LEO constellations.
Furthermore, 5G’s new technology can meet more complex application scenarios and services, anditsnewtransmissiontechnologywithhigher
spectrumutilizationcanbeusedin the new 5G LEO satellite mobile communication system. The LEO satellite based IoT is ideal for applications
such as monitoring of short data, remote or long-distance moving objects, andsensor dataacquisition. However, duetothe high-speedmovement of
LEOsatellitesand the variety of business, terminals are scattered in various areas, which makes the business
analysis of LEO satellite based IoT relatively difficult [5]. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the law and characteristics of traffic, and guide the
design the architecture of LEO satellite based IoT . The reminder of this paper is organized as follows. Section I describes the development
of the IoT and leads to LEO satellite based IoT. Section II analyzes the characteristics and application scenarios of LEO satellite based IoT.
The third section studies the distribution of LEO satellite based IoT business and simulates them. Finally, Section V concludes this work and
looks forward to the future research directions.
CHAPTER-II

LEO SATELLITE BASED IOT

A. System Characteristics

The LEO satellite based IoT is an important complement and extension of the terrestrial IoT and the only way to address global coverage [6].
Compared with the terrestrial IoT, it has the following significant advantages:
WideCoverage:ThecoverageofLEOsatellitesismuchlargerthanthat ofterrestrial ones, and a reasonable design of LEO satellite
constellations can achieve global seamless coverage.

Large Capacity: The capacity of broadband satellites can support a large number of terminals. Satellite constellations usually
consist of dozens or even hundreds of satellites, greatly enhancing system capacity.

High Reliability: The LEO satellites are distributed at an altitude of 700-1500 km, and the terrain and weather have little effect on
them. The system still works when the natural disaster on the ground causes communication to be interrupted. Detailed
comparison is shown in Table 1, based on the above advantages, the LEO satellite based IoT is mainly used for marine monitoring,
hydrological monitoring, environmental protection and mineral resources exploration.
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IOT

B. Business TransmissionProcess

Fig.1. Architecture of LEO Satellite based IoT System

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As shown in Fig.1, the LEO satellite based IoT is divided into space segment, ground segment and user segment. Since the terminal
of LEO satellite based IoT is far away from thesatellite, the terminal’s transmission power is required to be larger, and the terminal’s
signaling interaction process should be minimized to accommodate frequent route switching between satellites [7]. Finally,
through the modular integrated design [8],itcan support the IoT business needs of different scenarios.
As an important supplement and extension of the groundbased IoT, LEO satellite based IoT canmake up for theshortcomings of
limitedcoverage, weak disaster-resistance capability, thus gives full play to the advantages of global coverage, all-weather work, and
resilience. Its a new brand that combining the satellite communication system with the ground-based IoT system. Its characteristics
mainly include the following points:
Information transmission is dominated by short bursts. When the satellite is visible, the terminal sends the
data, and once it is finished, it turns into the deep sleep state immediately. In other words, the terminal is in a
dormant state for most of the time.
The business is cyclical. In most scenarios, the LEO satellite IoT application is in a delay- insensitive
scenario, so the terminal is not required to transmit data at all times, and periodically transmitting data can
greatly save power and prolong service life.
Regional. The particularity of the IoT terminal is basically the same in the same geographical area, and the
different geographical business types are generally different.
The single satellite coverage of the LEO satellite IoT is usually thousands of kilometers, and the number of
terminals that need to be serviced is huge. Due to the limited processing capacity of the satellite [9], if no
measures are taken, it is likely that the system will not work properly. Considering that at some point, not all
terminals have to upload data, a packetbased data distribution model can be used. In this mode, the terminals
are grouped into several groups according to the service requirements, priorities, physical locations, etc, and
only certain types of groups are allowed to send or receive data in a certain time, thereby reducing the
congestion probability [10]. In addition, the low power consumption of the terminal can be greatly reduced to
extend the life of the terminal. The UE-Satellite segment is similar to the transmitting part of LoRa [11]. Upon
finishing transmission, UE turns into deep sleep mode until next transmitting trigger. The Data Processing Gateway
(DPG) in EGS, which utilizes proxy cache scheme [12], stores all context information for establishing and resuming
connection. After receiving the satellite downlink data, DPG will identify different UEs data packages and then
simulates corresponding UE to complete higher layer operation using stored information. Through this kind of
scheme, not only the complementary advantages are realized, but also the pressure of the space segment is reduced.

CHAPTER-III
LEO SATELLITE IOT TRAFFIC SIMULATION

The business of the LEO satellite IoT, characterized by nonreal-time, low-rate, and low
latency, belongs to the interactive and background type [13]. The satellite moves at a high
speed, causing the beam coverage changes constantly, and thus the traffic source changes

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accordingly. In addition, the uneven distribution of terminals around the world makes
business distribution more complicated and changeable [14]. At the same time, the
communication between IoT terminals and satellites requires a higher elevation angle, while
single satellites beam coverage angle is narrow relatively, making the satellite business
source change faster.

A. Business Model

As mentioned in Section II, the LEO satellite IoT is mainly deployed in areas that cannot
be covered by the terrestrial network, so the factors affecting its traffic are mainly
topographic features and economic development levels

TABLE I - TERRESTRIAL IOT VS LEO SATELLITE BASED

Items Terrestrial IoT LEO Satellite based IoT

coverage dozens of kilometers global coverage
terminal ≤ 50 thousand ≥ 1 million
transmit schema NB-IoT, LoRa improved ground network, 5G
stability restricted by weather and geographical conditions hardly affected strong disaster resistance
application bike sharing, smart home, smart city logistics monitoring, environment protection, hydrological monitoring

• Topographical factors. This system is mainly used in areas that cannot be covered

by terrestrial networks such as forests, deserts, and oceans.

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IOT

• Economic development level. The higher the level of economic development, the

greater the probability of adopting this system, and the greater the business volume.

Considering that the system has very little traffic in the Antarctic and Arctic, the
constellation of this system has more satellites in those areas [15] thus we can just analyze
the rest of the world. Therefore, the area is divided into 4032 grids according to the
longitude by 5 and the latitude by 2.5. The business density in each grid is calculated
according to the economic development level and topography of the region [16]: 0.8 in
North America, 0.6 in South America, 0.4 in Africa, 0.7 in Asia, 0.8 in Europe, 0.5 in
Oceania, 0.1 in the open sea, and 0.6 in offshore area. 0.8 in some desert or forests areas.
Considering that domestic business demand is much larger than overseas, the ratio of
domestic and overseas business density is set to 10:1. In special, it is important to
emphasize here that the business model is not always the same, it will change as the
business source changes periodically, so that the system’s static location business model is
shown in fig.2

Fig.2. Static Location Business Model

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Business Simulation Method

According to the above discussion, the flow of calculating the traffic of single satellite is
shown in Fig.3. Among them,

Start

Compute

Sa tillite Postion

Compute Satellite Coverage Grid

Determine Local Time Determine Grid Traffic

Sum Up Coverage of All Grid

Total Traffic Within

TERMINATION

Fig.3.Traffic Simulation Method Chart

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 TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE
IOT

the satellites projection on the ground can be attached directly from the STK software.
The satellites coverage area can be determined by the following formula:

ϕ = cos−1 (r˙2 − r˙1)∗ r˙2 (1)

|(r˙2 − r˙1 )| ∗ |r˙2|
φ is the angle between satellite-grid connection vector and the grid position , visible
function ϕ = φ 90◦ ,usually, the lowest angle for terminals to communicate −is θ
= 10◦
, therefore, the above formula is corrected to ϕ = φ 90◦ θ,
as long as it is positive, the satellite and the IoT terminal are visible.

Simulation Result
Based on the above analysis, taking the Iridium constellation
with walker code(66,6,1) as an example, the traffic of a single satellite in its coverage
area within 24 hours is obtained

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 TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE
IOT

Fig.4.Satellite terminal visibility chart

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Fig.5.Single Satellite Traffic Change Chart

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The high-speed variability and suddenness of the service can be clearly seen from Fig.5.
Several higher positions are when the satellite runs over China, and the lower position is
when the satellite runs to the open sea.
Fig.6 and Fig.7 show the change of traffic of three satellites in different orbits and the
three orbit plane total traffic change, respectively. The relative traffic of different satellites
on the three orbital planes varies greatly at the same time, while the laws of change are
basically the same. Furthermore, the traffic of different orbital planes is not only different
at the same time, but also the influence of time factors on the peak size, mainly because
the local time of the satellite projection on the ground of different orbital planes is very
different. Taken together, the spatial distribution of the distribution of LEO satellite IoT
business varies widely.
For the LEO satellite IoT system, its traffic distribution is very sudden and versatile,
both in time and space [18]. When the business suddenly increases, there is a possibility
of access blocking, and when the traffic is small, it is a great waste for satellite
resources. Therefore, it is particularly important to study the resource management
strategy that changes with the traffic volume.

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 TRAFFIC ANALYSIS OF LEO SATELLITE
IOT

Fig.6.Three satelite traffic changes in diffirent orbital planes

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Fig.7.Three Orbital Planes Total Traffic Changes Chart

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Advantages of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite

A low Earth orbit requires the lowest amount of energy for satellite placement. It provides high bandwidth
and low communication latency. Satellites and space stations in LEO are more accessible for crew and
servicing.

Since it requires less energy to place a satellite into a LEO, and a satellite there needs less powerful
amplifiers for successful transmission, LEO is used for many communication applications, such as
the Iridium phone system. Some communication satellites use much higher geostationary orbits, and move at
the same angular velocity as the Earth as to appear stationary above one location on the planet.

Disadvantages of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite

Satellites in LEO have a small momentary field of view, only able to observe and communicate with a
fraction of the Earth at a time, meaning a network (or "constellation") of satellites is required to in order to
provide continuous coverage. Satellites in lower regions of LEO also suffer from fast orbital decay, requiring
either periodic rebooting to maintain a stable orbit, or launching replacement satellites when old ones re-
enter.

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Examples

• Earth observation satellites and spy satellites use LEO as they are able to see the surface of the Earth
clearly by being close to it. They are also able to traverse the surface of the Earth. A majority of
artificial satellites are placed in LEO,[13] making one complete revolution around the Earth in about 90
minutes.
• The International Space Station is in a LEO about 400 km (250 mi) to 420 km (260 mi) above Earth's
surface,[14] and needs reboosting a few times a year due to orbital decay.
• Iridium satellites orbit at about 780 km (480 mi).
• Lower orbits also aid remote sensing satellites because of the added detail that can be gained. Remote
sensing satellites can also take advantage of sun-synchronous LEO orbits at an altitude of about 800 km
(500 mi) and near polar inclination. Envisat (2002–2012) is one example of an Earth observation satellite
that makes use of this particular type of LEO (at 770 km (480 mi)).
• GOCE orbited at about 255 km (158 mi) to measure Earth's gravity field.
• GRACE were, and GRACE-FO are, orbiting at about 500 km (310 mi)
• The Hubble Space Telescope orbits at about 540 km (340 mi) above Earth.
• The Chinese Tiangong-2 station orbits at about 370 km (230 mi).

Fig.8.Example of Traffic Analysis of LEO Satellite IOT

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CONCLUSION
The LEO satellite IoT is not trying to replace the terrestrial IoT, but the complement
and extension, which can greatly ex- pand the coverage of the former and promote the
development of IoT. This paper describes the simulation method of LEO satellite IoT
traffic for the special application scenarios and business types. The simulation results
show that the distri- bution of LEO satellite system business has great burstiness and
variability in time and space. This non-uniformity is not conducive to the stability of
system performance. Therefore, when designing the LEO satellite IoT system, we must
first es- timate the distribution characteristics and laws of the business, and then guide the
determination of satellite communication capacity and constellation design.

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