Lecturers
Prof. Hong-Chuan Yang (University of Victoria, Canada)
Prof. Yang received the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota in 2003. He is a professor of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Victoria, Canada. From 1995 to 1998, He was a Research Associate at the Science and Technology Information Center (STIC) of the Ministry of Posts & Telecomm. (MPT), Beijing, China. His current work mainly focuses on different aspects of wireless communications, with special emphasis on channel modeling, diversity techniques, system performance evaluation, cross-layer design, and energy efficient communications. He has published over 200 journal and conference papers. He is the author of the book Introduction to Digital Wireless Communications by IET press and the co-author of the book Order Statistics in Wireless Communications. He is a registered professional engineer (P.Eng) in British Columbia, Canada.
Prof. Hina Tabassum (York University, Canada)
Hina Tabassum is currently an Assistant Professor at the Lassonde School of Engineering, York University, Canada. Prior to that, she was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Manitoba, Canada. She received her PhD degree from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in 2013. She is a Senior member of IEEE and registered Professional Engineer in the province of Ontario, Canada. She has published over 70 technical articles in well- reputed IEEE journals, magazines, and conferences. Her publications thus far have garnered 4000+ citations with an h-index of 29 (according to Google Scholar) – a record that is steadily growing. She is the founding chair of a special interest group on THz communications in IEEE Communications Society (ComSoc) – Radio Communications Committee (RCC). She has been recognized as an Exemplary Editor by IEEE Communications Letters, 2020, and an Exemplary Reviewer (Top 2% of all reviewers) by IEEE Transactions on Communications in 2015-2017, 2019, and 2020. Currently, she is serving as an Associate Editor in IEEE Communications Letters, IEEE Transactions on Green Communications, IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials, and IEEE Open Journal of Communications Society. Her research interests include stochastic modeling, analysis, and optimization of energy efficient multi-band 5G/6G wireless networks jointly operating on sub-6GHz, millimeter, and Terahertz frequencies with applications to vehicular, aerial, and satellite networks.
Prof. Mohamed-Slim Alouini (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia)
Professor Alouini general research interests include design and performance analysis of diversity combining techniques, MIMO techniques, multi-hop/cooperative communications systems, optical wireless communication systems, cognitive radio systems, green communication systems and networks, wireless communication systems and networks in extreme environments, and integrated ground-airborne-space networks. He is currently actively working on addressing the uneven global distribution, access to, and use of information and communication technologies by studying and developing new generations of aerial and space networks as a solution to provide connectivity to far-flung, less-populated, and/or hard-to-reach areas. Professor Alouini has published several papers on the above subjects and he is co-author of the textbook Digital Communication over Fading Channels published by Wiley Interscience. He has also won several awards in his career. For instance, he recently received the 2021 IEEE Communication Society Award, the 2020 IEEE Vehicular Technology Society James Evans Avant-Garde Award and the 2019 Technical Achievement Award of the IEEE Communication Society Communication Theory Technical Committee. Prior to this, he was honored in 2017 with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Science and Technology (S&T) Achievement Award in Engineering Science at the First OIC Summit on Science and Technology, Astana, Kazakhstan. He also received the 2016 Recognition Award of the IEEE Communication Society Wireless Technical Committee as well as the 2016 Abdul Hameed Shoman Award for Arab Researchers in Engineering Sciences. Other recognitions include his selection as (i) Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Optical Society of America (OSA), the African Academy of Science (AAS), the European Academy of Science and Arts (EASA), and the Academia Europaea (AE), (ii) IEEE Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Communication Society and for the IEEE Vehicular Technology Society, (iii) member for several times in the annual Thomson ISI/Clarivate Web of Knowledge list of Highly Cited Researchers as well as the Shanghai Ranking/Elsevier list of Most Cited Researchers and the AMiner 2020 list of the AI 2000 Most Influential Scholars in the area of Internet of Things, and (iv) a co-recipient of best paper awards in thirteen IEEE journals/conferences (including Communication Surveys & Tutorials, ICC, GLOBECOM, VTC, PIMRC, ISWCS, UCET, and DySPAN).
Abstract
To date, wireless technology has been developed primarily to broadcast data over radio frequency (RF) or sub-6GHz spectrum. However, the finite number of licensed RF bands cannot keep up with the future massive connectivity requirements. Extremely high frequencies (optical, mm-wave and Terahertz) [EHF] offer much wider transmission bandwidths with extreme data rates (in the order of multi-Gbps). Nevertheless, EHF transmissions are susceptible to severe path-loss attenuation resulting in smaller coverage zones and frequent switching among access points if a user is moving. Also, the EHF propagation characteristics vary significantly in different layers of the atmosphere due to diffraction, scattering, molecular absorption, etc. Subsequently, there is no one-size-fits all spectrum solution for a variety of emerging wireless applications and all frequencies are expected to co-exist in a future wireless network. It is thus critical for the community to understand the unique differences between conventional RF, visible light communications, free space
optical, mm-wave, and THz in terms of their transceiver design, channel propagation characteristics, mobility and resource management, and optimization of unique transceiver parameters. In this context, the tutorial will 1) go through the role of EHF transmissions in 6G, pin-point fundamental challenges in the integration of RF and EHF networks, and present recent standardization activities for EHF transmissions, 2) present proof-of-concept results and identify use-cases of different multi-band network architectures where EHF transmissions coexist with conventional RF spectrum, and 3) provide a vision and path forward for multi-band networks in 6G.
Motivation and Context
To date, wireless technology has been developed primarily to broadcast data over radio frequency (RF) or sub-6GHz spectrum. However, the finite number of licensed RF bands cannot keep up with the future massive connectivity requirements. Extremely high frequencies (optical, mm-wave and Terahertz) [EHF] offer much wider transmission bandwidths with extreme data rates (in the order of multi-Gbps). Nevertheless, EHF transmissions are susceptible to severe path-loss attenuation resulting in smaller coverage zones and frequent switching among access points if a user is moving. Also, the EHF propagation characteristics vary significantly in different layers of the atmosphere due to diffraction, scattering, molecular absorption, etc. Subsequently, there is no one-size-fits all spectrum solution for a variety of emerging wireless applications and all frequencies are expected to co-exist in a future wireless network. It is thus critical for the community to understand the unique differences between conventional RF, visible light communications, free space optical, mm-wave, and THz in terms of their transceiver design, channel propagation characteristics, mobility and resource management, and optimization of unique transceiver parameters. In this context, the tutorial will 1) go through the role of EHF transmissions in 6G, pin-point fundamental challenges in the integration of RF and EHF networks, and present recent standardization activities for EHF transmissions, 2) present proof-of-concept results and identify use-cases of different multi-band network architectures where EHF transmissions coexist with conventional RF spectrum, and 3) provide a vision and path forward for multi-band networks in 6G.
Structure and Content
Part-I (45-60 min):
Starting from the vision, key performance indicators (KPIs), and key enabling techniques (KETs) of 6G wireless networks, this tutorial will focus on the role of multi-band communications networks in 6G where optical, mm-wave and Terahertz transmissions will coexist with the conventional RF spectrum. In this part, we will provide fundamental background on the unique propagation characteristics of EHF transmissions, and pin-point the significance and intricacies of integrating EHF with RF spectrum at the PHY and MAC layer, while highlighting different types of multi-band network architectures. Also, we will discuss some of the fundamental challenges related to network dimensioning, mobility management, and resource optimization in multi-band networks. Then, the tutorial will delve into the specific challenges of multi-band network architectures from the perspective of transceiver design, deployment of hybrid access points, resource management, traffic offloading, and mobility management.
Part-II (90 min):
Recent research results will be presented to demonstrate potential techniques that can overcome some of the design challenges and answer the questions such as (1) whether mobility can be efficiently supported through multi-band communications? (2) how to efficiently associate and offload devices in a multi-band network? and (3) how the network resource management can be designed to combat the shorter channel coherence time in EHF transmissions.
This part of the tutorial is designed to focus on the modeling, analysis, and optimization of a multi-band network, where EHF can complement RF efficiently, while considering the requirement of the application and transmission environment. The challenges such as optimal spectrum access, network deployment, and traffic offloading among networks with extremely unique features have not been tackled in the existing research. Furthermore, most of the existing resource management solutions are not fast and scalable which is critical for EHF networks due to the extremely short time of channel variations. As such, the tutorial will focus on training the tutorial attendees on issues like (1) developing novel statistical performance models to characterize the large-scale performance of the multi-band network, (2) developing fast and scalable algorithms for network planning and resource management in order to combat extremely short channel coherence time in EHF, (3) developing energy-efficient, sustainable, and EMF-aware multi-band network architectures, where EHF transmissions will be enhanced with the use of passive transmission technologies (such as reconfigurable intelligent surfaces).
Part-III (45 min):
Finally, the talk will pin-point some of the emerging technologies that can be leveraged to enhance the multi-band 6G networks’ reliability. The issues include dynamic network access, data rate control, wireless caching, data offloading, network security, and connectivity preservation which are all important to next generation networks such as 5G and beyond.