Highly Flexible RAN Slicing Approach to Manage Isolation, Priority, Efficiency

The evolution toward 5G is driven by the need of providing a wide range of services differing on needed network functionalities, performance requirements, type of devices, and going beyond the human-type communications. Such a wide variety of requirements cannot be always met through a common network setting, hence, high network flexibility and scalability are required. Network slicing allows the operation of multiple end-to-end logical networks on a common physical infrastructure: each network slice is tailored to best support a specific service. Network slicing on the radio access network (RAN) domain is challenging. In order to manage the scarce radio resources, RAN slicing requires flexibility, efficient resource sharing, and customization. Hence, dynamic resource management presents unique challenges, it has to take into account different issues that can also be in contrast with each other. This paper proposes a two-layer scheduler for an efficient and low complexity RAN slicing approach in actual systems. It is shown that simply setting some parameters it is possible to achieve different trade-offs between isolation and efficiency, allowing the management of priority and customization. The performance of the proposed method has been compared with other benchmark approaches to show good behavior and the flexibility of the proposed approach

heterogeneous public safety network architecture based on ran slicing

Efficient communications are of paramount importance to improve public safety (PS) operations allowing better coordination, higher situation awareness, lower response times, and higher efficiency during emergency. Consequently, the evolution of PS communication networks toward commercial broadband networks is widely well accepted. However, this evolution has to cope with several challenges, such as the provision of sufficient communication capacity, coverage, and resilience as well as deployment costs and efficient exploitation of radio resources. This has triggered the need of new architectural solutions. In this paper, we propose a heterogeneous network communication architecture where both infrastructures and spectrum are shared between PS and commercial operators thus reducing deployment costs and times, and addressing the main challenges of PS communications. The shared radio access network (RAN) is managed by means of network slicing and resources virtualization. The proposed architecture is based on a three-tier scheduler that allows to manage different network layers and different RAN slices. Numerical results derived by means computer simulations are provided in order to highlight the efficiency and flexibility of the proposed architecture in comparison with benchmark alternatives

Experimental measurements of a joint 5G-VLC communication for future vehicular networks

One of the main revolutionary features of 5G networks is the ultra-low latency that will enable new services such as those for the future smart vehicles. The 5G technology will be able to support extreme-low latency. Thanks to new technologies and the wide flexible architecture that integrates new spectra and access technologies. In particular, Visible Light Communication (VLC) is envisaged as a very promising technology for vehicular communications, since the information can flow by using the lights (as traffic-lights and car lights). This paper describes one of the first experiments on the joint use of 5G and VLC networks to provide real-time information to cars. The applications span from road safety to emergency alarm