Abstract
Recent advances on wireless energy transfer (WET) make it a promising solution for powering future Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices enabled by the upcoming sixth-generation (6G) era. The main architectures, challenges and techniques for efficient and scalable wireless powering are overviewed in this article. Candidates enablers, such as energy beamforming (EB), distributed antenna systems (DASs), advances on devices' hardware and programmable medium, new spectrum opportunities, resource scheduling, and distributed ledger technology are outlined. Special emphasis is placed on discussing the suitability of channel state information (CSI)-limited/free strategies when powering simultaneously a massive number of devices. The benefits from combining DAS and EB, and from using average CSI whenever available, are numerically illustrated. The pros and cons of the state-of-the-art CSI-free WET techniques in ultralow power setups are thoroughly revised, and some possible future enhancements are outlined. Finally, key research directions toward realizing WET-enabled massive IoT networks in the 6G era are identified and discussed in detail.
Highlights
T HE SIXTH generation (6G) of wireless systems targets a data-driven sustainable society, enabled by nearinstant, secure, unlimited and green connectivity [1]–[3]
The reason is that for information decoding the metric of interest is based on a ratio, e.g., the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) or signal-to-noise-plus-interference ratio (SINR), and what it matters is how stronger/weaker is the signal power compared to the noise (+interference) level; while the nominal received power is what matters for EH purposes
wireless energy transfer (WET) is a promising solution for powering the IoT in the 6G era where a huge number of devices will require steady and uninterrupted operation
Summary
T HE SIXTH generation (6G) of wireless systems targets a data-driven sustainable society, enabled by nearinstant, secure, unlimited and green connectivity [1]–[3]. Stringent performance requirements in terms of security and trust, throughput, sensing capabilities, dependability, scalability and energy efficiency, as illustrated, have been set by industry and academy to fulfill such a vision. The ultimate vision in terms of energy efficiency is that of a green society assisted by 6G networks, specially by zero-energy/cost/emission Internet-of-Things (IoT) deployments [3], [4]. This is still a major concern due to the lack of mature solutions for powering and keeping uninterrupted operation of the massive number of devices.
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