An optimal search strategy for mobile stations in wireless networks

Efficient abstractions for location management is a key consideration in wireless networks that support universal personal communications. Location management involves a tracking component that maintains dynamic data on the location of mobile stations through a distributed database, and a search component that prescribes the manner in which the wireless network is to be paged so as to determine the location of mobile stations whose whereabouts are unknown. In this paper, we focus on the search component of location management. We employ techniques from statistical search theory and describe a stochastic sequential framework that systematically determines the location of mobile stations situated within a group of cells. This strategy is optimal in the sense that it minimizes the expected cost of search. Based on this optimal policy, we construct two search algorithms. The first is based on a tableau approach while the second has a Bayesian character