Performance Evaluation of Forward Link Packet Scheduling in Satellite Communication Systems with Carrier Aggregation

Scientific Conference (2022)

The rapidly growing demand for increased data rates and spectrum scarcity in satellite communication systems require new paradigms to effectively utilize radio resources. Of many candidate techniques ... [more ▼]

The rapidly growing demand for increased data rates and spectrum scarcity in satellite communication systems require new paradigms to effectively utilize radio resources. Of many candidate techniques, carrier aggregation (CA) is a promising solution that combines multiple carriers across the available spectrum to achieve a substantial increase in peak data rate and improve user experience. The concept of CA was introduced in 3GPP standards for the terrestrial communication systems and has been successfully deployed and commercialized worldwide. Recently, satellite communication community has investigated the requirements for adopting CA technique to satellite infrastructures. In this setting, aggregating multiple heterogeneous satellite links to boost a single-user peak throughput requires an efficient data packet scheduler at the gateway in order to avoid the out-of-order packet issues and the subsequent queuing delays at the receiver side. Thereby, several research efforts have been devoted to circumvent this challenge through developing packet schedulers that are aiming at delivering data packets without perturbing their original transmission order. In this paper, the performance of the developed schedulers is evaluated using end-to-end system simulations to investigate the impact of different network metrics. The obtained results demonstrate the design tradeoffs and summarize the pros and cons of the schedulers. [less ▲]

Experimental Comparison of RF Waveform Designs for Wireless Power Transmission

in Experimental Comparison of RF Waveform Designs for Wireless Power Transmission (2021, October)

The possibility to harvest energy from ambient radio-frequency (RF) sources has intrigued humankind for the past several decades. In this context, there has been a tremendously growing research interest ... [more ▼]

The possibility to harvest energy from ambient radio-frequency (RF) sources has intrigued humankind for the past several decades. In this context, there has been a tremendously growing research interest in the field of wireless power transfer (WPT) using the RF range of the electromagnetic (EM) spectrum. In this paper, we experimentally investigate the aspect of real-time energy harvesting (EH) via different types of waveform designs such as orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), square, triangular, sinusoidal, and sawtooth. We make use of a Software Defined Radio (SDR) and a Powercast P21XXCSR-EVB EH module to carry out the experiments on the practical device to assess performance. Specifically, we are interested in obtaining insights based on the comparison between the aforementioned waveform designs from the perspectives of the separation distance between the USRP and P21XXCSR-EVB EH module, and power emission via USRP. In this vein, some additional experiments are subsequently performed after a suitable candidate waveform has been reported. The demonstration of the EH is provided in terms of the abovementioned investigation metrics while seeking the best waveform to support WPT. [less ▲]

A Cubesat-ready Phase Synchronization Digital Payload for Coherent Distributed Remote Sensing Missions

Poster (2021, July 15)

Distributed antenna arrays, fractionated payloads and cooperative platforms can provide unprecedented performance in the next generation of spaceborne communications and remote sensing systems. Remote ... [more ▼]

Distributed antenna arrays, fractionated payloads and cooperative platforms can provide unprecedented performance in the next generation of spaceborne communications and remote sensing systems. Remote phase synchronization of physically separated oscillators is the first step towards a coherent operation of distributed systems. This work shows the preliminary results of a TDD remote phase synchronization algorithm with a master-follower architecture. Herein, we describe the implementation and validation of the proposed algorithm. The implementation has been conducted in a Cubesat-ready software defined radio and validated at the end-to-end satellite communications testbed available at the University of Luxembourg. [less ▲]

5G-SpaceLab

Poster (2021, April 19)

The new phase of space exploration involves a growing number of human and robotic missions with varying communication and service requirements. Continuous, maximum coverage of areas where activities are ... [more ▼]

The new phase of space exploration involves a growing number of human and robotic missions with varying communication and service requirements. Continuous, maximum coverage of areas where activities are concentrated and orbiting missions (single spacecraft or constellations) around the Earth, Moon or Mars will be particularly challenging. The standardization of the 5G Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN) has already begun [1], and nothing prevents 5G from becoming a common communications standard supporting space resource missions [2]. The 5G Space Communications Lab (5G-SpaceLab) is an interdisciplinary experimental platform, funded by the Luxembourg Space Agency and is part of the Space Research Program of SnT. The lab allows users to design and emulate realistic space communications and control scenarios for the next-generation of space applications. The capabilities of the 5G-SpaceLab testbed combine the experience of different disciplines including space communications, space and satellite mission design, and space robotics. The most relevant include the demonstration of SDR 5G NTN terminals including NB-IoT, emulation of space communications channel scenarios (e.g. link budget, delay, Doppler…), small satellite platform and payload design and testing, satellite swarm flight formation, lunar rover and robotic arm control and AI-powered telerobotics. Earth-Moon communications is one of the scenarios demonstrated in the 5G-SpaceLab. Bidirectional communication for the teleoperation of lunar rovers for near real-time operations including data collection and sensors feedback will be tested. AI-based approaches for perception and control will be developed to overcome communication delays and to provide safer, trustworthy, and efficient remote control of the rovers. [1] 3GPP Release 17 Timeline. [Online]. Available: https://www.3gpp.org/release-17 [2] Nokia, Nokia selected by NASA to build first ever cellular network on the Moon. [Online]. Available: https://www.nokia.com/about-us/news/releases/2020/10/19/nokia-selected-by-nasa-to-build-first-ever-cellular-network-on-the-moon/ [less ▲]

Interference Mitigation Methods for Coexistence of Radar and Communication

in 15th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EuCAP) (2021)

We consider a communications-centric spectrum sharing scenario where the communications link has a minimum service constraint in throughput and the radar maximizes its receive signal-to-interference-plus ... [more ▼]

We consider a communications-centric spectrum sharing scenario where the communications link has a minimum service constraint in throughput and the radar maximizes its receive signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR). Prior works on joint power, allocation indicate that, under a communication-centric scenario, radar transmit power is gradually reduced as the throughput demand for communications link increases. Such an approach results in severe degradation of radar SINR, especially when the communications link suffers an outage. We propose methods based on successive-interference-cancellation to improve the radar SINR. This comprises both coexistence and coordination approaches. Numerical experiments show significant improvement in radar SINR when communications throughput demand rises and eventually goes into the outage. [less ▲]