Control-Aware Shapley-Value-Based Bandwidth Allocation for SATCOM Terminals under Heterogeneous Delays

Abstract

Dynamic bandwidth sharing in Satellite Communication (SATCOM) is challenging due to limited link capacity, finite terminal buffer sizes, and delayed bandwidth requests. Under high-load conditions, these factors can jointly lead to queue buildup and traffic loss. Many SATCOM systems rely on centralized bandwidth management in which Remote Terminals (RTs) submit bandwidth requests that are processed by a Satellite System Controller (SSC) on an epoch basis. In practice, the request–allocation loop experiences non-negligible round-trip delay due to propagation, processing, transmission, and queueing, which can cause demand mismatch and degraded queue behavior. This paper studies a delay-aware SATCOM terminal-management framework in which each terminal uses a Linear Quadratic Regulator (LQR) to generate bandwidth requests, while the SSC allocates limited aggregate capacity across terminals. We implement a control-aware Shapley allocation method that formulates resource (bandwidth) allocation as a cooperative game and assigns rates according to each terminal’s marginal contribution, subject to capacity and request constraints. The approach is evaluated under heterogeneous per-terminal delay settings and compared with a baseline weight-based proportional allocation scheme. Using dropped traffic, queueing delay, utilization, and computational complexity as evaluation metrics, the study characterizes trade-offs between the two allocation strategies and identifies operating conditions under which each method is preferable.