UPF Peer Discovery for Low-Latency 5G Data Path Selection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing 5G network UPF chaining methods do not consider link status and latency between user plane functions (UPFs), leading to potential QoS issues and increased hops due to hardwired selection.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a multicast group of UPFs for inter-UPF communication to exchange peer attributes, including link latency and UPF chaining capabilities, allowing the session management function (SMF) to select optimal UPF combinations that minimize latency and prevent looping.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If hardwired selection of UPFs is used for UPF chaining, then UPF selection is simplified and deterministic, but additional hops are added and link latency is increased
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by having UPFs pre-discover and report their peer UPFs and link latencies to the SMF before actual data traffic flows. The SMF stores this information and uses it for optimal UPF chain selection, thereby avoiding real-time discovery delays and preventing high-latency links from being selected.
2Ease of manufacture
If static configuration and policy based selection is used to map UPF capability to UPFs, then UPF selection is deterministic and easy to implement, but link status and latency between UPFs are not considered
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback by having UPFs continuously discover their peer UPFs and report link latency information back to the SMF. The SMF maintains an updated view of the UPF network topology and uses this feedback information to make informed decisions about UPF chain selection, ensuring both ease of implementation and QoS reliability.
3Device complexity
If UPF chaining is implemented without considering link latency, then data plane routing is simplified, but QoS requirements may not be met due to huge link latency
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by having the SMF pre-establish UPF chains based on reported link latency information before actual data traffic flows. This allows the SMF to select UPF combinations that minimize total link latency, ensuring both simplified data plane routing and high data transmission efficiency.
4Loss of information
If multicast group communication between UPFs is implemented, then peer attribute information is obtained, but communication overhead between UPFs is increased
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies self-service by having each UPF independently discover its peer UPFs and link latencies using multicast communication, then report this self-collected information to the SMF. This distributes the discovery burden across all UPFs rather than requiring centralized discovery, reducing overall communication overhead while ensuring complete peer attribute information is available.
Data Source
AI summary
A method comprises: at user plane functions (UPFs) of a network, creating a multicast group of the UPFs to enable inter-UPF communication between the UPFs in a multicast domain and, by each UPF: exchanging messages with peer UPFs of the UPFs in the multicast domain to learn peer attributes of the peer UPFs; reporting the peer attributes of the peer UPFs to a session management function (SMF) of the network; and at the SMF, selecting, for a data session, particular UPFs of the UPFs to be configured into a UPF chain of a data path for traffic from user equipment to a data network, based on the peer attributes of the peer UPFs as reported by the UPFs.