81 research outputs found
Evolution of NOMA Toward Next Generation Multiple Access (NGMA) for 6G
Due to the explosive growth in the number of wireless devices and diverse
wireless services, such as virtual/augmented reality and
Internet-of-Everything, next generation wireless networks face unprecedented
challenges caused by heterogeneous data traffic, massive connectivity, and
ultra-high bandwidth efficiency and ultra-low latency requirements. To address
these challenges, advanced multiple access schemes are expected to be
developed, namely next generation multiple access (NGMA), which are capable of
supporting massive numbers of users in a more resource- and
complexity-efficient manner than existing multiple access schemes. As the
research on NGMA is in a very early stage, in this paper, we explore the
evolution of NGMA with a particular focus on non-orthogonal multiple access
(NOMA), i.e., the transition from NOMA to NGMA. In particular, we first review
the fundamental capacity limits of NOMA, elaborate on the new requirements for
NGMA, and discuss several possible candidate techniques. Moreover, given the
high compatibility and flexibility of NOMA, we provide an overview of current
research efforts on multi-antenna techniques for NOMA, promising future
application scenarios of NOMA, and the interplay between NOMA and other
emerging physical layer techniques. Furthermore, we discuss advanced
mathematical tools for facilitating the design of NOMA communication systems,
including conventional optimization approaches and new machine learning
techniques. Next, we propose a unified framework for NGMA based on multiple
antennas and NOMA, where both downlink and uplink transmissions are considered,
thus setting the foundation for this emerging research area. Finally, several
practical implementation challenges for NGMA are highlighted as motivation for
future work.Comment: 34 pages, 10 figures, a survey paper accepted by the IEEE JSAC
special issue on Next Generation Multiple Acces
- …