Abstract
Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) technologies are considered key technologies for terrestrial 5G massive machine-type communications (mMTC) applications. It is less known that NOMA techniques were pioneered about ten years ago in the satellite domain to match the growing demand for mMTC services. This paper presents the key features of the first NOMA-based satellite network, presenting not only the underlying technical solutions and measured performance but also the related deployment over the Eutelsat satellite fleet. In particular, we describe the specific ground segment developments for the user terminals and the gateway station. It is shown that the developed solution, based on an Enhanced Spread ALOHA random access technique, achieves an unprecedented throughput, scalability and service cost and is well matched to several mMTC satellite use cases. The ongoing R&D lines covering both the ground segment capabilities enhancement and the extension to satellite on-board packet demodulation are also outlined. These pioneering NOMA satellite technology developments and in-the-field deployments open up the possibility of developing and exploiting 5G mMTC satellite- and terrestrial-based systems in a synergic and interoperable architecture.
Highlights
Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA)-based systems have been recently investigated by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) [1] as a promising set of emerging technologies able to provide a more efficient utilization of wireless resources for future 5G networks
As the search for an optimal protocol for the satellite broadcast application had already been successfully concluded by means of the standardized DVB-SH protocol [8,9,10], the effort towards the satellite Internet of Things (IoT) protocol was concentrated on the return link only, and the future European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) S-band Mobile Interactive Multimedia (S-MIM) standard would be a combination of DVB-SH and the newly defined Enhanced Spread Spectrum ALOHA (E-Spread Spectrum ALOHA (SSA)) return link protocol
The LEO scenario requires low-power consumption demodulation algorithms, as demodulation takes place on board and is typically based on low-cost COTS hardware. The synergy between these two projects led to the definition of an air interface to be adopted in GEO Ku and Ka band scenarios, with terminals equipped with low-gain flat antennas. Such air interface, named IURA (IoT Universal Radio Access), is based on E-SSA on the return link, which is able to work at very low carrier-to-noise power ratios (i.e., C/N below −20 dB) thanks to the processing gain provided by the large spreading values, and an evolved GEMMA waveform on the forward link, in order to deal with values of C/N below −15 dB
Summary
Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA)-based systems have been recently investigated by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) [1] as a promising set of emerging technologies able to provide a more efficient utilization of wireless resources for future 5G networks. The S-MIM extension targeted the Ku and Ka bands (corresponding to 11–14 GHz and 20–30 GHz frequency ranges, respectively), where a few gigahertz of bandwidth per service area was available and commercially exploited by a large number of geostationary satellites. This development effort has materialized into the specification and implementation of the so-called F-SIM system [5] and the launch of the Eutelsat SmartLNB technology, today operationally deployed in four continents under the “IOT FIRST” brand, with SmartLNB terminals reaching their third generation [6]. As the search for an optimal protocol for the satellite broadcast application had already been successfully concluded by means of the standardized DVB-SH protocol [8,9,10], the effort towards the satellite IoT protocol was concentrated on the return link only, and the future ETSI S-MIM standard would be a combination of DVB-SH and the newly defined E-SSA return link protocol
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