Approaches for high speed global packet data services for leo/meo satellite systems

A satellite communications system comprising:

• one or more low earth orbit (LEO) satellites;
• one or more medium earth orbit (MEO) satellites;
• a control plane protocol architecture where physical (PHY), media access control (MAC), MAC radio link control (MAC/RLC) and radio resource control (RRC) layers are optimized for a satellite environment, wherein, when the satellites are not processing satellites, e-node-B (eNB) functions are implemented in a satellite gateway, and, when the satellites are processing satellites, protocol architecture in the control plane for the satellite system have the following differences from LTE:
• PHY layer is moved to the communicating LEO/MEO satellite on the user link,
• MAC/RLC, RRC and packet data control plane (PDCP) may be located in satellite or gateway depending on complexity of the satellite, and the need to have mesh connectivity between user terminals,
• when the RRC is implemented in satellite, the RRC is divided into RRC-Lower (RRC-L) and RRC-Upper (RRC-U) layers, wherein the RRC-L is located in the satellite and is responsible for handover signaling with user terminals, and the RRC-U is located in the eNB′ and is responsible for resource management functions including admission control, and
• the RRC-U communicates with the PDCP layer in the eNB′ to configure security, header compression and data compression schemes.