An NDN-Enabled Fog Radio Access Network Architecture With Distributed In-Network Caching

To meet the increasing demands of next-generation cellular networks (e.g., 6G), advanced networking technologies must be incorporated. On one hand, the Fog Radio Access Network (F-RAN), has been proposed as an enhancement to the Cloud Radio Access Network (C-RAN). On the other hand, efficient network architectures, such as Named Data Networking (NDN), have been recognized as prominent Future Internet candidates. Nevertheless, the interplay between F-RAN and NDN warrants further investigation. In this paper, we propose an NDN-enabled F-RAN architecture featuring a strategy for distributed in-network caching. Through a simulation study, we demonstrate the superiority of the proposed in-network caching strategy in comparison with baseline caching strategies in terms of network resource utilization, cache hits, and fronthaul channel usage.