Mobility Enhancement in 5G NR

Overview In Release 15 of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) 5G new radio (NR), the basic handover is mainly based on the long-term evolution (LTE) handover mechanism in which a network controls mobility of user equipment (UE) based on measurement reports from UE. In the basic handover, a source next generation Node B (gNB) … Read more

Small Data Transmission (SDT): Protocol Aspects

Overview Signals for transitioning to a radio resource control (RRC) connected state and maintaining the RRC connected state could cause overheads (e.g., power consumption and delay) to a wireless device having a small amount of data to transmit when in an RRC idle state or an RRC inactive state. The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) … Read more

Terahertz Communications

Higher frequency bands than that being employed in fifth generation (5G) communications, such as terahertz (THz) bands, are envisioned for future communications in the next decade. This article discusses envisioned use cases of THz communications, technical challenges, and the industry’s view of THz communications in sixth generation (6G) communications.  download the whitepaper

6G Network Architecture

Overview With the commercialization of fifth generation (5G) technologies, the communications industry has started research activities on a sixth generation (6G) communication system. This article discusses services and requirements of 6G as well as possible network architectures to support these requirements. What’s inside: This article discusses some new services and applications for 6G. To support … Read more

eXtended Reality (XR)

This article discusses eXtended Reality (XR) and aspects necessary for incorporating XR in fifth-generation (5G) new radio (NR) radio access network (RAN) as well as areas for potential enhancements for the commercial viability and scalability of XR supported by 5G networks. download the whitepaper

5G for Industry 4.0

As Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) emerges, reduction of human intervention becomes inevitable. To facilitate realization of promising features of future factory automation, 3GPP has launched various initiatives to study potential integration of 3GPP communication systems to support industry. Time sensitive communication offers deterministic network behavior to support real-time applications while non-public networks enable deployment … Read more

3GPP: The Unlicensed Journey

Along the long road 3GPP has traversed towards realization of cellular technologies operating in unlicensed bands, evolutions have taken place across the wireless industry and real-world applications, shaping, and at times, altering the expectations, design goals, and foundations of the technology. This paper provides an insight into such evolutions as well as brief descriptions of … Read more

New Features in the Next Release of 5G New Radio

Hua Zhou, Wireless Technology Specialist at Ofinno, recently wrote a whitepaper which presents an overview of some 3GPP Rel-17 features enhancing efficiency and performance of 5G NR Rel-15/16, addressing the needs of vertical industries and supporting satellites and HAPs. There are many other features targeting different performance metrics (such as latency reduction and quality of … Read more

Smart Railway Stations Lunch and Learn

During a recent Lunch & Learn, Weihua Qiao presented on the topic of “Smart Railway Stations.”  A Smart Railway Station uses different types of electronic Internet of Things (IoT) sensors to collect data to improve efficiency, mobility and sustainability.  The premise of this concept is to create a barrier and stress free experience for every … Read more

Standard Activities for Unmanned Aerial Systems

In the modern lexicon, pilotless aircraft are known as “drones”. In English, the term has long referred to male honeybees. Unlike worker bees, who gather nectar and pollen, a drone’s only function is to mate with an unfertilized queen bee. According to military historian Steven Zaloga, the term has been applied to pilotless aircraft since … Read more

Employing Fifth Generation (5G) Mobile Communication Networks for Sensor Management in Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR)

Cellular communications have made major technological advancements to keep up with developments in other fields such as automation, multimedia, and sensor management. These technological developments can be repurposed to support ISR purposes. In particular, the 5G terrestrial infrastructure can provide a national radar tracking network. download the article

Wireless Device Power Savings in 5G

Advancements in battery technology continues to be slow compared to increasing data rate and bandwidth demands of fifth generation (5G) cellular technology such that battery life could become a bottleneck for 5G. Power saving techniques are therefore vital to the success of 5G. This article gives a brief introduction to many of these power savings … Read more

5G Cellular Technology for Connected Cars Receives Boost from European Legislators

On July 4th, 2019, twenty-one of the twenty-eight European Union (EU) countries voted against a European Commission plan that would have effectively shut out 4G/5G cellular communications as an option for vehicle-to-everything (V2X). This decision gives cellular V2X (C-V2X) a major boost. V2X works to allow traffic elements (such as vehicles, roadside infrastructures, networks, and … Read more

Wi-Fi and LTE-Unlicensed

Coexistence of Wi-Fi and LTE-Unlicensed (LTE-U) technologies has drawn significant concern in industry. In this paper, we investigate the Wi-Fi performance in the presence of duty cycle based LTE-U transmission on the same channel. More specifically, one LTE-U cell and one Wi-Fi basic service set (BSS) coexist by allowing LTE-U devices to transmit their signals … Read more

New Radio for 5G

Overview New radio (NR) is a study item in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project Radio Access network Working Group (3GPP RAN-WG) focusing on a new Radio Access Technology (RAT) for the 5th Generation (5G) cellular communications systems. Together with the next generation core network (NextGen Core), NR fulfills requirements set forth by the International Telecommunication … Read more