An open question recently posed by Fawzi and Ferme [IEEE Transactions on Information Theory 2024], asks whether non-signaling (NS) assistance can increase the capacity of a broadcast channel (BC). We answer this question in the affirmative, by showing that for a certainK-receiver BC model, called Coordinated Multipoint broadcast (CoMP BC) that arises naturally in wireless networks, NS-assistance provides multiplicative gains in both capacity and degrees of freedom (DoF), even achievingK-fold improvements in extremal cases. Somewhat surprisingly, this is shown to be true even for 2-receiver broadcast channels that are semi-deterministic and/or degraded. In a CoMP BC,Bsingle-antenna transmitters, supported by a backhaul that allows them to share data, act as oneB-antenna transmitter, to send independent messages toKreceivers, each equipped with a single receive antenna. A fixed and globally known connectivity matrix specifies for each transmit antenna, the subset of receivers that are connected to (have a non-zero channel coefficient to) that antenna. Besides the connectivity, there is no channel state information at the transmitter. The receivers have perfect channel knowledge. We show that NS-assistance has no DoF advantage in a fully connected CoMP BC. The DoF region is fully characterized for a class of connectivity patterns associated with tree graphs, for which the classical sum-DoF value is shown to be the number of leaf nodes, while the NS-assisted sum-DoF value is the total number of all (non-root) nodes. For arbitrary connectivity patterns, the sum-capacity with NS-assistance is bounded above and below by the min-rank and triangle number of the connectivity matrix, respectively, leading to matching bounds in many cases, e.g., if min(B,K) ≤ 6. While translations to Gaussian settings are demonstrated, for simplicity most of our results are presented under noise-free, finite-field (Fq) models. Converse proofs for classical DoF are found by adapting the Aligned Images bounds to the finite field model. Converse bounds for NS-assisted DoF/capacity extend the same-marginals property to the BC with NS-assistance available to all parties. Beyond the BC setting, even stronger (unbounded) gains in capacity due to NS-assistance are established for certain ‘communication with side-information’ settings, such as the fading dirty paper channel.
Jorge Soria, Jorge Moya Velasco, Carlos Estévez-Mendoza
Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN) represent an emerging organizational form for operating physical infrastructure through blockchain-based coordination. DePIN through decentralized protocols and token-based payment mechanisms incentivize independent agents to deploy, maintain, and monetize real-world infrastructure, such as wireless networks, storage units, or sensors. This article presents a first formal economic analysis of DePIN architectures, modelling investment decisions under network effects in a blockchain-native Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO), with protocol-defined reward schemes. It establishes the equilibrium conditions that support decentralized provision, where token prices internalize participation, service reliability, and network coverage. Furthermore, it identifies a minimum viable coverage threshold determined by costs and network effects. Through a multi-agent machine learning simulation, we confirm that decentralized provision improves efficiency compared to centralized models. The results support the economic viability of DePIN and provide design guidelines for future decentralized infrastructure protocols. Finally, we propose an DAO incentive mechanism to implement First Best provision in Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks.
The rapid advancement of 6G communication networks presents both considerable problems and opportunities in network management, necessitating sophisticated solutions that extend beyond conventional methods. This study seeks to investigate and evaluate autonomous network management solutions designed for 6G communication networks, highlighting their technical advantages and potential implications. We examine the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and network automation in facilitating self-organization, optimization, and decision-making within critical network domains, including spectrum management, traffic load balancing, fault detection, and security and privacy. We examine the integration of edge computing and Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), specifically blockchain, to improve trust, transparency, and security in autonomous networks. This study provides a comprehensive understanding of the technological developments driving fully autonomous, efficient, and resilient 6G network infrastructures by methodically analyzing existing methodologies, identifying significant research gaps, and exploring potential prospects. The results offer significant insights for researchers, engineers, and industry experts involved in the development and deployment of advanced autonomous network management systems.
Mamoon M. Saeed, Rashid A. Saeed, Mohammad Kamrul Hasan, Elmustafa Sayed Ali · 8 authors
After adopting 5G technology, businesses and academia have started working on sixth-generation wireless networking (6G) technologies. Mobile communications options are expected to expand in areas where previous generations could not do so. 6G networks are anticipated to be constructed using various diverse technologies. These encompass diverse cutting-edge advancements, such as distributed ledger systems like blockchain, visible light communications (VLC), post-quantum cryptography, edge computing, molecular communication, THz, and other advances. These advances necessitate a reassessment of previous security strategies from a security perspective. In the future, networks must adhere to stricter criteria for authentication, encryption, access control, connectivity, and detection of harmful activities. Ensuring privacy and dependability necessitates the implementation of supplementary security protocols. The essay explores the primary concerns and challenges related to the security of the 6G network. This paper describes the improvements in security in communications from 1G through 6G. This paper divides security in the sixth generation into three layers: physical, connection, and service. Each layer-by-layer discusses the standard technologies and security issues for each technology proposed in each sixth-generation security layer. All proposed solutions for each of the three layers are discussed in Sixth Generation Security. It also reviews all proposed solutions for each layer, indicating the proposed solution and its limitations.
The advent of 6G networks places very high demands on ultra-low latency, high throughput, and quantum-secure communication to power Industry 5.0 use cases. Traditional blockchain architectures, given their decentralized and secure nature, often fall short in meeting the performance and security requirements of such an ecosystem. In this paper, we present a post-quantum blockchain architecture that employs CRYSTALS-Dilithium and SPHINCS+ for digital signatures and block and transaction verification, respectively, along with zk-STARKs to facilitate scalable zero-knowledge proof-based privacy, and a DPoS+VDFs consensus protocol to satisfy fairness and efficiency. We prototyped and evaluated the proposed framework with a benchmarking setup composed of Python, PQClean, liboqs, and Google Benchmark tools. Experimental results demonstrate that the system achieves a 40% reduction in latency, a 35% increase in transaction throughput, and a 25% reduction in computational overhead due to the integration of zk-STARK. Furthermore, finality time for consensus was reduced by 30% by using the hybrid DPoS-VDF consensus approach. Comparative studies with various lattice-, hash-, and code-based quantum cryptographic primitives have shown that CRYSTALS-Dilithium and SPHINCS+ outperform others in key generation, signing, and verification performance indicators, and thus qualify as optimal solutions for edge-centric 6G infrastructures. Conversely, zk-Starks showed near-optimal timeliness and verification effectiveness among the several examined zero-knowledge proof schemes. These findings validate the proposed framework as an efficient, scalable, and performance-enhanced blockchain solution for securing industrial ecosystems with latency sensitivity in a 6G-enabled environment.
One of the greatest ways to guarantee that networks designed for fifth generation (5G) and beyond reach the required levels of spectrum efficiency (SE) is through nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA). This work presents two new blockchain-based techniques that take advantage of massive multiple input multiple output in a single-cell network to improve performance. NOMA power domain is used in the 5G cooperative cognitive radio network (CCRN) to improve the SE of the downlink. This study investigates a novel cooperative NOMA-based CCRN for underlay spectrum sharing. A cooperative NOMA technique is proposed by considering the access modes of relays and secondary users (SUs) on the secondary network. The proposed system's performance is assessed with respect to random channel characteristics, frequency-selective Rayleigh fading and perfect successive interference cancellation (SIC). The first signal decoded by SU identifies the relay states with the best channel quality between users and the destination users to offset the bit error rate. The throughput dropped during the period because of the perfect SIC. The precise closed-form expressions for the system throughput of the secondary network are derived under the interference constraint of the primary network to evaluate the efficacy of the suggested cooperative strategy. The suggested approaches are assessed under various conditions using the MATLAB application by considering varying transmit power levels, power location coefficients and lengths. In every case, four users are assumed to be using a 90 MHz bandwidth and M-ary Quadrature Amplitude Modulation technology. • Each user (PU and SU) is transformed into blockchain-like blocks that collaborate to create a decentralised network. • The cooperative users' authentication verifies the energy detection technique for spectrum sensing and its results. • Blockchain technology is used to leverage the security of the massive-MIMO network and improve user performance by using digital signatures to confirm PU and MU's identities and preventing MU from using PUs bandwidth. • The identification of an in individual sensing for broadcast channel, cooperative channel for M-MIMO DL PD NOMA with relay CCRN is use to validate the energy detection, throughput, spectrum efficiency, and BER.
The advent of 6G networks promises revolutionary advances in dynamism, intelligence, and decentralization. Realizing the full potential of 6G requires adaptable service level agreements (SLAs) that can optimize performance based on dynamic network conditions. In this paper, we suggested a method based on the Hyperledger Sawtooth blockchain’s smart contract with the Reptile meta-learning algorithm to solve the rigidity of static SLA and centralization problems. In order to sustain the quality of service in the radio access network and core network domain of 6G networks, this work focuses on SLA management for efficient resource allocation for the eMBB-plus slice. Our approach entails breaking down static SLAs into finer-grained components, transferring those components onto Hyperledger Sawtooth smart contracts, and using the Reptile meta-learning algorithm to forecast SLA metrics and resource requirements. A dynamic tariff model, also proposed within the smart contract, handles increased user demands. We evaluate the solution by analyzing Reptile performance, resource allocation, and SLA violations under dynamic demands. Results demonstrate the efficiency of this AI-driven, blockchain-based approach for automated, optimized 6G eMBB-plus resource management adhering to dynamic fine-grained SLAs. This work highlights the synergistic potential of AI and blockchain for trusted and intelligent 6G service delivery.
Symbiotic communication (SC) is known as a new wireless communication paradigm, similar to the natural ecosystem population, and can enable multiple communication systems to cooperate and mutualize through service exchange and resource sharing. As a result, SC is seen as an important potential technology for future sixth-generation (6G) communications, solving the problem of lack of spectrum resources and energy inefficiency. Symbiotic relationships among communication systems can complement radio resources in 6G. However, the absence of established trust relationships among diverse communication systems presents a formidable hurdle in ensuring efficient and trusted resource and service exchange within SC frameworks. To better realize trusted SC services in 6G, in this paper, we propose a solution that converges SC and blockchain, called a symbiotic blockchain network (SBN). Specifically, we first use cognitive backscatter communication to transform blockchain consensus, that is, the symbiotic blockchain consensus (SBC), so that it can be better suited for the wireless network. Then, for SBC, we propose a highly energy-efficient sharding scheme to meet the extremely low power consumption requirements in 6G. Finally, such a blockchain scheme guarantees trusted transactions of communication services in SC. Through ablation experiments, our proposed SBN demonstrates significant efficacy in mitigating energy consumption and reducing processing latency in adversarial networks, which is expected to achieve a sustainable and trusted 6G wireless network.
Muhammad Rizwan, Mudassir Ali, Ammar Hawbani, Xingfu Wang · 8 authors
Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) energy trading based on distributed ledger technologies (DLT), such as blockchains, has attracted much attention due to its promising features, including ease of deployment, decentralization, transparency, and security. However, existing DLT-based models do not support microtransactions due to the low value of such transactions relative to the incentives offered to transaction verifiers. To address this issue, we propose an IOTA DLT-based efficient and secure energy trading model for V2G networks, where electric vehicles (EVs) and grids negotiate energy prices in an off-chain manner. The proposed model utilizes a privacy-preserving protocol to prevent real-time tracking of EV locations. We develop a Stackelberg game model to represent the interactions between the EVs and grids, from which we derive a pricing scheme and propose a deposit mechanism to prevent fake energy trading between the EVs and grids. Extensive simulations demonstrate that our proposed scheme outperforms existing V2G energy trading mechanisms regarding transaction efficiency, provides enhanced EV privacy, and improves resilience against fake energy trading. Offering robust computational performance and addressing computational complexity (time, space, and message), our model presents a comprehensive V2G energy trading solution, balancing efficiency, security, and privacy.
Litao Ye, Bin Chen, Shrivastava Shivanshu, Chen Sun · 7 authors
Centralized Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) faces challenges like data security, high management costs, and limited scalability. To address these issues, a blockchain-based DSS scheme has been proposed in this paper. First, we utilize the ERC4907 standard to mint Non-Fungible Spectrum Tokens (NFSTs) that serve as unique identifiers for spectrum resources and facilitate renting. Next, we develop a smart contract for NFST auctions, ensuring secure spectrum transactions through the auction process. Lastly, we create a Web3 spectrum auction platform where users can access idle spectrum data and participate in auctions for NFST leases corresponding to the available spectrum. Experimental results demonstrate that our NFST, designed according to the ERC4907 standard, effectively meets users' secure and efficient DSS requirements, making it a feasible solution.
Distributed ledger technology, with its multitude of advantages including immutability, transparency, decentralization, and security, has excellent potential to promote and even revolutionize future 6G mobile networks. Large-scale distributed ledger deployment within or for mobile networks relies on distributed ledger-focused standards to facilitate and ensure interoperability. The European Telecommunications Standards (ETSI) Industry Specification Group (ISG) on Permissioned Distributed Ledger (PDL) develops PDL-related standards, targeting various application verticals, especially within the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) domain. This article aims to give an overview of ETSI ISG PDL and describes selected PDL standards, which have synergies with future 6G mobile networks.
In wireless sensor networks (WSN), a large share of the energy demand arises from wireless communication, especially in wide area networks where transmission distances are at the scale of kilometers.Ensuring reliability of communication links while optimizing energy demand requires heterogeneous radio configurations throughout the network demanding for an automated process for identifying suitable transceiver settings in order to mitigate the effort of manual configuration during deployment.Furthermore, wireless links are susceptible to dynamic influences such as environmental conditions and interference from concurrent channel usage, rendering static radio configuration impractical.Therefore, autonomous organization and self-configuration of wireless communication networks, such as transmission parameter optimization, drastically reduce cost and effort for installation and maintenance of large-scale sensor systems.Such dynamic adaptive behavior can be achieved by local execution of decentralized methods that enable decision-making at the network edge, while also inherently offering advantages such as enhanced system robustness and scalability.In this work, we present a method that exemplifies this approach and experimentally evaluate its performance on real hardware.The adaptive algorithm optimizes the transmitter configuration of a LoRa transceiver by employing a model-free reinforcement learning approach based on an actor-critic setup using a parameterized stochastic policy and state-value function approximation.Experimental results show that the approach surpasses a standard approach in terms of long-term energy demand.Furthermore, the method's capability of adapting to dynamic wireless channels is demonstrated.
Summary Small cell networks can fulfill the increasing demandfor the high data rate of wireless applications. Energy efficiency is an important design parameter of the ultra dense small cell network (UDSCN). The sleeping strategy of small base stations (s‐BSs) is used to enhance the network's energy efficiency. An efficient sleeping strategy of s‐BSs is required while preserving users' quality of service (QoS). The idle s‐BSs can be switched to sleep mode. This paper proposes a blockchain‐enabled solution for the sleeping strategy of s‐BSs. Here, a blockchain‐enabled small cell network is created between the s‐BSs. The network is decentralized, which eliminates the workload of the macro base station (MBS). The proposed network architecture is enabled as a decentralized network through blockchain. The blockchain provides distributed control over the s‐BS operations through a smart contract. Here, smart contracts act as distributed self organizing network features to handle self‐transactions among small cells for switching off s‐BSs in the network. All the software logic required to perform s‐BS operations is written in a smart contract using Ethereum. The proposed solution improves energy efficiency and enables the ultra dense small cell network to be decentralized.
Abstract In this article, the authors proposed a novel blockchain‐oriented location privacy‐preserving (BoLPP) for the Cooperative Spectrum Sensing (CSS) in 6G networks. In order to attain the sustainability of privacy and security for 6G wireless networks, it is a great challenge in this sensing as it faces various malicious attacks while the secondary user (SU) is active. To tackle these issues, the authors proposed a novel framework for blockchain‐oriented Cognitive Radio Networks (CRNs) for CSS using an energy detection technique. Moreover, the authors implemented another novel paradigm BoLPP, to attain the privacy of SUs location for CSS in 6G networks. This approach preserves the SUs’ location and makes the BoLPP framework immune to all malicious attackers. The simulation results have been undergone based on the performance metrics such as response time, consistency, probability of false alarm, frame loss (%), average network throughput, energy efficiency, and security. The outcomes reveal that the proposed scheme achieves high security, privacy, energy efficiency, average network throughput, and low probability of false alarm and frame loss (%) when compared with the existing frameworks such as Friend or Foe (FoF) and Tidal Trust Algorithm (TTA) mechanisms. It is observed that the proposed BoLPP mechanism provides better security and privacy in 6G wireless networks.
Meroua Moussaoui, Nischal Aryal, E. Bertin, Noël Crespi
Cellular networks have played a critical role in building today’s Internet. However, they are facing more and more challenges such as softwarization and programmability, decentralization, as well as opening to new business models, while keeping a very high level of trust and reliability. DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) is a promising field to address these challenges in an innovative way. In this paper, we present a comprehensive analysis of DLT applications for cellular networks, covering the Radio Access Network (RAN), Core Network (CN), Applications & services, as well as Inter-actor communication & cooperation.
Lina Al‐Sahan, Noureddine Lasla, Mohamed Abdallah, Bo Wang
Abstract The licensed band is crowded and suffers from immense mobile data traffic growth, which exceeded 58 exabytes per month in 5 years. Meanwhile, a significant portion of the unlicensed band is underutilized and not coordinated efficiently. Experiments in some urban areas of the world have shown that only 5% of the unlicensed 5 GHz band is being used. 5G NR‐U technology supports 5G networks in the unlicensed band to alleviate the traffic congestion and boosts 5G networks capacity. Different heterogeneous network access technologies already use the unlicensed band. Consequently, 5G NR‐U networks will operate in the proximity of the other coexisting networks, such as WiFi networks in the 5 GHz and 6 GHz bands. In such environments, assessing the shared spectrum becomes challenging and necessitates adequate protocols to identify idle slots for successful transmissions. Cooperative Spectrum Sensing (CSS) improves the spectrum assessment process, as the decision about the spectrum state is rendered based on the local decisions of multiple sensing nodes. CSS is exploited by integrating it with Blockchain technology to design a decentralized cooperative spectrum management system called: Blockchain‐Based Cooperative Spectrum Management (BCSM). The system is attributed to ameliorating 5G NR‐U awareness about the neighboring WiFi networks traffic in the unlicensed band. An algorithm is designed for performing distributed cooperative spectrum assessment between the 5G NR‐U base stations to profile the WiFi networks traffic in their proximity. To ensure fairness based on the effort expended in assessing the spectrum, a priority‐based algorithm is designed for spectrum access scheduling. A proof‐of‐concept is implemented using private Ethereum Blockchain and NS3 simulator. Finally, the system's accuracy is evaluated empirically along with theoretical security analysis.
Despite numerous prior attempts to boost transaction per second (TPS) of blockchain systems, many sacrifice decentralization and security. This paper proposes a bodyless block propagation (BBP) scheme for which the blockbody is not validated and transmitted during block propagation, to increase TPS without compromising security. Nodes in the blockchain network anticipate the transactions and their ordering in the next upcoming block so that these transactions can be pre-executed and pre-validated before the block is born. For a network with $N$ nodes, our theoretical analysis reveals that BBP can improve TPS scalability from $O(1/log(N))$ to $O(1)$. Ensuring consensus on the next block's transaction content is crucial. We propose a transaction selection, ordering, and synchronization algorithm to drive this consensus. To address the undetermined Coinbase address issue, we further present an algorithm for such unresolvable transactions, ensuring a consistent and TPS-efficient scheme. With BBP, most transactions require neither validation nor transmission during block propagation, liberating system from transaction-block dependencies and rendering TPS scalable. Both theoretical analysis and experiments underscore BBP's potential for full TPS scalability. Experimental results reveal a 4x reduction in block propagation time compared to Ethereum blockchain, with TPS performance being limited by node hardware rather than block propagation.
In this article, we address the problem of prolonging the battery life of Internet of Things (IoT) nodes by introducing a smart energy harvesting framework for IoT networks supported by femtocell access points (FAPs) based on the principles of Contract Theory and Reinforcement Learning. Initially, the IoT nodes' social and physical characteristics are identified and captured through the concept of IoT node types. Then, Contract Theory is adopted to capture the interactions among the FAPs, who provide personalized rewards, i.e., charging power, to the IoT nodes to incentivize them to invest their effort, i.e., transmission power, to report their data to the FAPs. The IoT nodes' and FAPs' contract-theoretic utility functions are formulated, following the network economic concept of the involved entities' personalized profit. A contract-theoretic optimization problem is introduced to determine the optimal personalized contracts among each IoT node connected to a FAP, i.e., a pair of transmission and charging power, aiming to jointly guarantee the optimal satisfaction of all the involved entities in the examined IoT system. An artificial intelligent framework based on reinforcement learning is introduced to support the IoT nodes' autonomous association to the most beneficial FAP in terms of long-term gained rewards. Finally, a detailed simulation and comparative results are presented to show the pure operation performance of the proposed framework, as well as its drawbacks and benefits, compared to other approaches. Our findings show that the personalized contracts offered to the IoT nodes outperform by a factor of four compared to an agnostic type approach in terms of the achieved IoT system's social welfare.
Onel L. Alcaraz López, Hirley Alves, Richard Demo Souza, Samuel Montejo‐Sánchez · 6 authors
Recent advances on wireless energy transfer (WET) make it a promising solution for powering future Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices enabled by the upcoming sixth-generation (6G) era. The main architectures, challenges and techniques for efficient and scalable wireless powering are overviewed in this article. Candidates enablers, such as energy beamforming (EB), distributed antenna systems (DASs), advances on devices' hardware and programmable medium, new spectrum opportunities, resource scheduling, and distributed ledger technology are outlined. Special emphasis is placed on discussing the suitability of channel state information (CSI)-limited/free strategies when powering simultaneously a massive number of devices. The benefits from combining DAS and EB, and from using average CSI whenever available, are numerically illustrated. The pros and cons of the state-of-the-art CSI-free WET techniques in ultralow power setups are thoroughly revised, and some possible future enhancements are outlined. Finally, key research directions toward realizing WET-enabled massive IoT networks in the 6G era are identified and discussed in detail.
The convergence of dynamic spectrum access (DSA) and blockchain has been regarded as the new paradigm of spectrum management. Because of the inherent properties of blockchain, such as decentralization and tamper-resistance, the deployment of blockchain in future networks has advantages to address problems exposed in traditional centralized spectrum management systems, such as high security risk and low allocation efficiency. In this article, we first compare blockchain-based spectrum management with the traditional centralized approach and then present a reference architecture for blockchain-based spectrum management. In particular, we propose an interference-based consensus mechanism, which can be employed to improve transaction efficiency and reduce system overhead while promoting spectrum sharing. The proposed consensus mechanism is based on the comparison of aggregated interference experienced by each node, such that the node that suffers the most aggregated interference will obtain the accounting right as a compensation. Furthermore, to avoid harmful interference caused by spectrum traders, an interference-based transaction validation mechanism is designed to validate the spectrum transactions stored in the blocks. Different from existing transaction validation mechanisms in which every transaction needs to be validated by all nodes, a “transaction validation area” is determined for each spectrum transaction, and only the nodes located in the validation area need to validate the transaction. The simulation results show that the system fairness and nodes’ signal-to-interference-and-noise power ratio (SINR) can be improved by adopting the proposed mechanisms while reducing the system overhead.
Adaptive capacity with cost-efficient resource provisioning is a crucial capability for future 6G networks. In this work, we conceptualize "expansive networks" which refers to a networking paradigm where networks should be able to extend their resource base by opportunistic but self-controlled expansive actions. To this end, we elaborate on a key aspect of an expansive network as a concrete example: Spectrum resource at the PHY layer. Evidently, future wireless networks need to provide efficient mechanisms to coexist in the licensed and unlicensed bands and operate in expansive mode. In this work, we first describe spectrum sharing issues and possibilities in 6G networks for expansive networks. We then present security implications of expansive networks, an important concern due to more open and coupled systems in expansive networks. We also discuss two key enablers, namely distributed ledger technology (DLT) and network intelligence via machine learning, which are promising to realize expansive networks for the spectrum sharing aspect.
5G networks are expected to provide cost-efficient, reliable, and flexible services for industrial productions and applications potentially, by introducing emerging network technologies like blockchain and network functions virtualization (NFV), which virtualizes network functions and runs them on standard infrastructure rather than customized hardware. However, how to deal with the emerging security challenges and fulfil the requirement of ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (URLLC) has not been fully resolved. In this article, we present an NFV-enabled 5G paradigm for the industry with the guarantee of URLLC through service chain acceleration and dynamic blockchain-based spectrum resource sharing among a variety of industry applications running in NVF-based equipment. First, we elaborate the benefits and shortcomings of NFV for industry, by executing an industry application experiment in virtualized and nonvirtualized data center networks. Then, we illustrate an NFV-enabled 5G paradigm for URLLC in detail, with a special focus on the service chain acceleration and spectrum sharing built on NFV, blockchain, software-defined networking, and mobile edge computing. Finally, we establish a mathematical model to study the worst-cast transmission latency of NFV-enabled 5G with the input of the bursty traffic. The proposed model can be exploited to support the plan, management, and optimization of NFV-enabled 5G URLLC systems for industry.
Emanuele Di Pascale, Hamed Ahmadi, Linda Doyle, Irene Macaluso
Neutral Host Small Cell Providers (SCP) represent a key element of the 5G\nvision of ultra-dense mobile networks. However, current business models mostly\nfocus on multi-year agreements for large venues, such as stadiums and hotel\nchains. These business agreements are regulated through binding Service Level\nAgreements (SLAs), which tend to be too cumbersome and costly for smaller scale\nSCPs. As a result, the neutral host model does not scale up to its full\npotential. In this paper, we propose a framework to enable the participation of\nsmall- to medium-sized players in the cellular market as providers offering\nnetwork resources to Mobile Network Operators (MNOs). To this purpose, we\nreview the current and emerging spectrum and technology opportunities that SCPs\ncan use for neutral host deployments. We also propose the use of\nblockchain-enabled smart contracts as a simple and cost-efficient alternative\nto traditional SLAs for small-scale SCPs. To demonstrate this, we describe a\nproof of concept implementation of an Ethereum-based smart contract platform\nfor best-effort service between an SCP and an MNO. Our simulations on potential\nsmart contract-based deployments in city centre Dublin show that the received\nsignal strength in the considered area will increase by an average of $10$\npercent.\n
Asuquo A. Okon, Ibrahim Elgendi, Olusegun Samuel Sholiyi, Jaafar M. H. Elmirghani · 6 authors
Whereas 4G LTE networks have brought about an increase in data rates of mobile networks, they are unable to meet the capacity demands of future networks. Specifically, the centralized nature of the evolved packet core (EPC) makes the network non-scalable to match the exponential increase in number of wireless devices in addition to the complexities of diverse service requirements. The SDN concept has recently attracted a lot of research interest as a viable proposition for bringing about programmability and ease of network management while also offering flexibility for innovative network designs. However, current SDN implementations are not adapted to support business agreements that foster interoperability among mobile network operators (MNOs). This paper is an extended version of our earlier work and we intend to present a unified SDN and blockchain architecture with enhanced spectrum management features for enabling seamless user roaming capabilities between MNOs. Our simulation results show that users can experience no disruption in service with very minimal delay as they traverse between operators.