Cross-Layer Routing Method for the SCTP with Multihoming MIPv6

The multihoming is regarded as a kind of technology to provide wide-band and relaible network service. The protocol called Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) [1] can manage the multi-homed nodes to realize a highly-available data transfer capability in the Transport Layer. An SCTP node may keep a combination of the sets of the eligible source and destination transport addresses. The node can detect if a transport address is out of service by periodical messaging which is called HEARTBEAT in SCTP. If the HEARTBEAT is unacknowledged, the node will change to send data via another transport address which is with a HEARTBEAT ACK. The multi-homed mobility nodes, such as the cellphones implemented with both WiFi and 3G, are widely used in the world. Mobility Support in IPv6 (Mobile IPv6, MIPv6) [2] is a protocol to provide a mobility function in IP layer. However the SCTP is not a protocol designed for the moving nodes, such as the nodes using the Mobile IP (MIP). Also there is an enhanced SCTP called mSCTP [3] which enables the mobility at the Transport Layer. But the mSCTP is not designed for the multihoming Mobile IP. In this paper, we suggest a new cross-layer routing method to use the SCTP with the multihoming MIPv6. Our proposal is mobile node can use SCTP to select an optimized transport peer in real time.