DASH-based Peer-to-Peer Video Streaming in Cellular Networks

Cellular networks have increasing demands for video streaming applications recently. This makes it challenging for cellular networks operators to provide streaming services with high Quality of Experience (QoE). Here, we propose a novel architecture for improving the QoE of video streaming in cellular networks. The architecture employs Base-Station (BS) -assisted Peer-to-Peer (P2P) video streaming in cellular networks. Furthermore, the architecture employs the Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH); an adaptive bit rate video streaming technique. We use the Discrete EVent System Specification (DEVS) formalism to build a model for the proposed architecture in an LTE-A network, and use the model to study the performance achieved by the proposed architecture in terms of many video streaming QoE metrics. We also use the model to simulate a conventional DASH video streaming over a cellular network, i.e., without P2P streaming. Simulation results show that the proposed architecture achieves significant improvement in terms of video streaming QoE.