Selective Beam Research Articles

Beam SNR Prediction Using Channel Charting

We consider a machine learning approach for beam handover in mmWave 5G New Radio systems, in which User Equipments (UEs) perform autonomous beam selection, conditioned on a used Base Station (BS) beam. We develop a network-centric approach for predicting beam Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) from Channel State Information (CSI) features measured at the BS, which consists of two phases; offline and online. In the offline training phase, we construct CSI features and dimensionality-reduced Channel Charts (CC). We annotate the CCs with per-beam SNRs for different combinations of a BS beam and the corresponding best UE beam, and train models to predict SNR from CSI features for different BS/UE beam combinations. In the online phase, we predict SNRs of beam combinations not being used at the moment. We develop a low complexity out-of-sample algorithm for dimensionality reduction in the online phase. We consider <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$k$</tex-math></inline-formula> -nearest neighbors, Gaussian process regression, and neural network-based predictions. To evaluate the efficacy of the proposed framework, we perform simulations for a street segment with synthetically generated CSI. We investigate the complexity-accuracy trade-off for different dimensionality reduction techniques and different predictors. Our results reveal that nonlinear dimensionality reduction of CSI features with neural network prediction shows the best performance, and the performance of the best CSI-based prediction method is comparable to prediction based on using known physical location.

ESEIABS: Energy and spectrum efficient hybrid technique for 5G and beyond networks using interference aware beam selection

ESEIABS: Energy and spectrum efficient hybrid technique for 5G and beyond networks using interference aware beam selection

Beam Selection Algorithm Utilizing Fingerprint DB Based on User Types in UAV Support Systems

Beam Selection Algorithm Utilizing Fingerprint DB Based on User Types in UAV Support Systems

A unified path seeking algorithm for IMRT and IMPT beam orientation optimization

Objective. Fully automated beam orientation optimization (BOO) for intensity-modulated radiotherapy and intensity modulated proton therapy (IMPT) is gaining interest, since achieving optimal plan quality for an unknown number of fixed beam arrangements is tedious. Fast group sparsity-based optimization methods have been proposed to find the optimal orientation, but manual tuning is required to eliminate the exact number of beams from a large candidate set. Here, we introduce a fast, automated gradient descent-based path-seeking algorithm (PathGD), which performs fluence map optimization for sequentially added beams, to visualize the dosimetric benefit of one added field at a time. Approach. Several configurations of 2–4 proton and 5–15 photon beams were selected for three head-and-neck patients using PathGD, which was compared to group sparsity-regularized BOO solved with the fast iterative shrinkage-thresholding algorithm (GS-FISTA), and manually selected IMPT beams or one coplanar photon VMAT arc (MAN). Once beams were chosen, all plans were compared on computational efficiency, dosimetry, and for proton plans, robustness. Main results. With each added proton beam, Clinical Target Volume (CTV) and organs at risk (OAR) dosimetric cost improved on average across plans by [1.1%, 13.6%], and for photons, [0.6%, 2.0%]. Comparing algorithms, beam selection for PathGD was faster than GS-FISTA on average by 35%, and PathGD matched the CTV coverage of GS-FISTA plans while reducing OAR mean and maximum dose in all structures by an average of 13.6%. PathGD was able to improve CTV [Dmax, D95%] by [2.6%, 5.2%] and reduced worst-case [max, mean] dose in OARs by [11.1%, 13.1%]. Significance. The benefit of a path-seeking algorithm is the beam-by-beam analysis of dosimetric cost. PathGD was shown to be most efficient and dosimetrically desirable amongst group sparsity and manual BOO methods, and highlights the sensitivity of beam addition for IMPT in particular.

Radar Enhanced Multi-Armed Bandit for Rapid Beam Selection in Millimeter Wave Communications

Radar Enhanced Multi-Armed Bandit for Rapid Beam Selection in Millimeter Wave Communications

Low-Complexity Beam Selection Algorithms Based on SVD for mmWave Massive MIMO Systems

Low-Complexity Beam Selection Algorithms Based on SVD for mmWave Massive MIMO Systems

Beam Selection for Cell-Free Millimeter-Wave Massive MIMO Systems: A Matching-Theoretic Approach

In this letter, we consider beam selection in cell-free millimeter-wave (mmWave) massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems. To address the beam selection of all access points in the network for cell-free operation, a beam selection problem that maximizes the minimum of spectral efficiencies of all user equipments is formulated. We propose an extended deferred acceptance algorithm for beam selection based on the matching theory. Additionally, we propose two intuitive beam selection algorithms. System-level simulation results demonstrate the advantage of the proposed matching theory-based beam selection method in terms of spectral efficiency for cell-free mmWave massive MIMO systems.

Discrete phase shifts control and beam selection in RIS-aided MISO system via deep reinforcement learning

Discrete phase shifts control and beam selection in RIS-aided MISO system via deep reinforcement learning

A novel handover scheme for millimeter wave network: An approach of integrating reinforcement learning and optimization

The millimeter-Wave (mmWave) communication with the advantages of abundant bandwidth and immunity to interference has been deemed a promising technology to greatly improve network capacity. However, due to such characteristics of mmWave, as short transmission distance, high sensitivity to the blockage, and large propagation path loss, handover issues (including trigger condition and target beam selection) become much complicated. In this paper, we design a novel handover scheme to optimize the overall system throughput as well as the total system delay while guaranteeing the Quality of Service (QoS) of each User Equipment (UE). Specifically, the proposed handover scheme called O-MAPPO integrates the Reinforcement Learning (RL) algorithm and optimization theory. The RL algorithm known as Multi-Agent Proximal Policy Optimization (MAPPO) plays a role in determining handover trigger conditions. Further, we propose an optimization problem in conjunction with MAPPO to select the target base station. The aim is to evaluate and optimize the system performance of total throughput and delay while guaranteeing the QoS of each UE after the handover decision is made. The numerical results show the overall system throughput and delay with our method are slightly worse than that with the exhaustive search method but much better than that using another typical RL algorithm Deep Deterministic Policy Gradient (DDPG).

A Deep Learning Framework for Beam Selection and Power Control in Massive MIMO - Millimeter-Wave Communications

A fine power control policy and beam alignment is required between the base station (BS) and user equipment (UE) to achieve the promising performance of massive multiple input multiple output (MIMO) in millimeter wave (mmWave) communications. However, obtaining the channel state information (CSI) of mmWave - massive MIMO systems is challenging. In this paper, the beam-steering technique is used to estimate the signal strength from the BS to the user. \textcolor{blue}{We propose a novel learning framework to determine the suitable beam for a specific user and the transmit power for minimizing the cost including the transmit power and the unsatisfied rate when the channel is unknown}. In addition, we address the missing data problem, and then employ the long-short term memory (LSTM) on the temporal processed inputs to select the suitable beam. Furthermore, we design a learning agent to predict the proper transmit power from the transmitted SSBs taking into account the required transmission rate. We then validate the proposed learning framework on the Deep MIMO dataset constructed based on accurate ray-tracing channels. Numerical results show our proposed framework outperforms the state-of-the-art prediction strategies, and approximates the best performance which is obtained when the CSI is available.

Evaluating the Performance of Proposed Switched Beam Antenna Systems in Dynamic V2V Communication Networks.

This paper develops a novel approach for reliable vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication in various environments. A switched beam antenna is deployed at the transmitting and receiving points, with a beam management system that concentrates the power in each beam using a low-computation algorithm and a potential mathematical model. The algorithm is designed to be flexible for various environments faced by vehicles. Additionally, an anti-failure system is proposed in case the intelligent transportation system (ITS) system fails to retrieve real-time Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR) values related to traffic density. Performance metrics include the time to collision in seconds, the bit error rate (BER), the packet error rate (PER), the average throughput (Mbps), the beam selection probability, and computational complexity factors. The proposed system is compared with traditional systems. Extensive experiments, simulations, and comparisons show that the proposed approach is excellent and reliable for vehicular systems. The proposed study demonstrates an average throughput of 1.7 Mbps, surpassing conventional methods' typical throughput of 1.35 Mbps. Moreover, the bit error rate (BER) of the proposed study is reduced by a factor of 0.1. Additionally, the proposed framework achieves a beam power efficiency of touching to 100% at computational factor of 34. These metrics indicate that the proposed method is both efficient and sufficiently robust.

Multi-modal fusion for millimeter-wave communication systems: A spatio-temporal enabled approach

In millimeter-wave (mmWave) massive multi-input multi-output (MIMO) systems, beam selection can enhance channel capacity and reduce error rate. However, existing beam selection methods for MIMO systems rely on traditional optimization techniques, which may not be feasible for real-time data transmission. Hence, this paper proposes a novel beam prediction approach via multi-modal fusion and spatio-temporal-enabled features. Specifically, the proposed method can improve MIMO system performance by integrating information from multiple perspectives, such as temporal, spatial, and frequency domains. Moreover, the proposed approach is based on a deep learning framework utilizing 3-dimensional convolutional neural networks (3DCNNs) and transformer module to capture spatio-temporal data correlations. Extensive simulation results show that the proposed mechanism outperforms massive benchmarks in terms of beam prediction accuracy from 2.63% to 11%.

Spatial attention and quantization-based contrastive learning framework for mmWave massive MIMO beam training

Deep learning (DL)-based beam training schemes have been exploited to improve spectral efficiency with fast optimal beam selection for millimeter-wave (mmWave) massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems. To achieve high prediction accuracy, these DL models rely on training with a tremendous amount of labeled environmental measurements, such as mmWave channel state information (CSI). However, demanding a large volume of ground truth labels for beam training is inefficient and infeasible due to the high labeling cost and the requirement for expertise in practical mmWave massive MIMO systems. Meanwhile, a complex environment incurs critical performance degradation in the continuous output of beam training. In this paper, we propose a novel contrastive learning framework, named self-enhanced quantized phase-based transformer network (SE-QPTNet), for reliable beam training with only a small fraction of the labeled CSI dataset. We first develop a quantized phase-based transformer network (QPTNet) with a hierarchical structure to explore the essential features from frequency and spatial views and quantize the environmental components with a latent beam codebook to achieve robust representation. Next, we design the SE-QPTNet including self-enhanced pre-training and supervised beam training. SE-QPTNet pre-trains by the contrastive information of the target user and others with the unlabeled CSI, and then, it is utilized as the initialization to fine-tune with a reduced volume of labeled CSI. Finally, the experimental results show that the proposed framework improves beam prediction accuracy and data rates with 5% labeled data compared to existing solutions. Our proposed framework further enhances flexibility and breaks the limitation of the quantity of label information for practical beam training.

Mmwave massive MIMO: one joint beam selection combining cuckoo search and ant colony optimization

In order to degrade the inter-user interference caused by the same beam selected for different users in mmWave massive MIMO systems, this paper proposes a joint beam selection combining cuckoo search (CS) and ant colony optimization (ACO) (referred to as CSACO). Differently from the existing interference-aware beam selection, a candidate beam set (CBS) for all users is created according to the power distribution of the beamspace channel, thereby all users can be classified into non-interfering users (NIUs) and interfering users (IUs), and NIUs will be assigned the beams with large power directly, while for IUs, the beams are selected by the CSACO; in the proposed CSACO, all beams for IUs are regarded as an optimizable individual, which is continuously evolved towards the direction of sum-rate maximization. Simulation results verify that the proposed beam selection can obtain the higher sum-rate and energy efficiency compared with the existing ones.

IUG‐based beam selection for wideband millimetre wave massive MIMO systems

AbstractBeam selection aims to select beams with large power and little inter‐user interference (IUI). In wireless communication scenarios, the levels of IUI are usually different, but, most existing beam selection methods apply the same beam selection criteria for all users, which is detrimental to maintain an attractive trade‐off between computational complexity and system performance. Considering the discrepancy of IUI comprehensively, this paper proposes a beam selection method based on interfering user grouping (IUG) for wideband millimetre‐wave massive multiple‐input multiple‐output (MIMO) systems. Firstly, a candidate beam set (CBS) is constructed in light of the sparsity and power distribution of the beamspace channel. Based on the CBS, all users are classified into non‐interfering users (NIUs), low‐interference users (LIUs) and high‐interference users (HIUs). For NIUs, the beams with large power are selected from CBS under the magnitude maximization (MM) criterion; for LIUs, a novel MM criterion with a tabu list is designed, which can effectively tackle the drawback of assigning shared beams in traditional MM; for HIUs, the incremental algorithm based on the sum‐rate maximization criterion is developed to find the optimal beams from CBS. Simulation results validate that the proposed IUG‐based method can obtain a good performance with lower computational complexity compared with the existing methods.

Intelligent deep learning‐aided future beam and proactive handoff prediction model in Unmanned Aerial Vehicle‐assisted anti‐jamming Terahertz communication system

SummaryWireless communications often suffer from legitimate transmissions regarding malicious jamming attacks launched through the smart jammer. The drone or unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communication networks derived with reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS) increase the issues of beam selection and proactive handoff in terahertz (THz). Thus, a new heuristic strategy is designed for efficient and incorporated optimization of the beamforming vector and anti‐jamming transmit power allocation in undefined environments. Here, the transmit power allocation and beamforming matrix of UAV are optimized with the developed hybrid heuristic algorithm of the Hybrid Crow Black Widow Search Optimization (HCBWSO) algorithm for maximizing the system achievable rate. Here, the HCBWSO algorithm is implemented to integrate with the Crow search algorithm (CSO) and Black Widow Optimization (BWO). The second contribution is to adopt RIS into THz–UAV communications, a new Enhanced Deep Temporal Convolutional Network (EDTCN) for predicting the future beam and proactive handoff of UAVs based on their prior analysis of the UAV locations, where the HCBWSO algorithm is utilized for recommending EDTCN. Here, the training of the EDTCN needs to be done with the collection of UAV information from the DEEPMIMO dataset for predicting the future beams and, also, tracking the location of the UAV. EDTCN helps in increasing the possibility of expanding the UAV coverage and also increases the consistency of the THz communication system. Thus, the prediction of the future beam increases the coverage area of the UAV and also maximizes the system rate in the THz communication system.

Vision Aided Environment Semantics Extraction and Its Application in mmWave Beam Selection

In this letter, we propose a novel mmWave beam selection method based on the environment semantics extracted from user-side camera images. Specifically, we first define the environment semantics as the spatial distribution of the scatterers that affect the wireless propagation channels and utilize the keypoint detection technique to extract them from the input images. Then, we design a deep neural network with the environment semantics as the input that can output the optimal beam pairs at the mobile station (MS) and the base station (BS). Compared with the existing beam selection approaches that directly use images as the input, the proposed semantic-based method can explicitly obtain the environmental features that account for the propagation of wireless signals, thus reducing the storage and computational burden. Simulation results show that the proposed method can precisely estimate the location of the scatterers and outperform the existing works based on computer vision or light detection and ranging (LIDAR).

Traffic-Aware Resource Allocation for Multi-User Beamforming

5G New Radio has been proposed to enhance the flexibility, scalability, and efficiency of 5G networks. By leveraging phased-array antennas, a BS can adaptively form multiple directional beams to serve geo-distributed UEs concurrently. However, the imperfect beam pattern of a phased-array antenna may create side lobes. While recent efforts have focused on beam selection that mitigates inter-beam interference and maximizes the sumrate, we notice that the selected beams may not be fully utilized in an OFDMA-based system. The root cause is that only a fixed set of beams can be configured at a time to serve a wide frequency band but some resource blocks may not be able to be allocated to any UEs due to limited traffic demands. To address the above problem, this paper presents traffic-aware joint beam configuration and resource allocation, which explicitly considers user traffic demands and configures beams that can optimally utilize the spectrum resources. We derive an approximation model that produces a suboptimal solution solvable by open-source solvers and further develop a low-complexity greedy algorithm for large-scale networks. Our simulation results show that the proposed traffic-aware allocation and beam configuration scheme achieves better utilization, especially when users have heterogeneous traffic demands.

Intelligent Analog Beam Selection and Beamspace Channel Tracking in THz Massive MIMO With Lens Antenna Array

Beamspace multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) as a green technology can efficiently substitute for the conventional massive MIMO, provided that the beamspace channel is acquired precisely. The prior efforts in this area of study, especially the learning-driven ones, however, indicate remarkable performance losses owing to a lack of generalization. In this paper, we propose a modified non-linear auto-regressive exogenous (NARX) model for tracking and predicting the beamspace channel over the sequences of time. Benefiting from bounded generalization error, fast convergence, limited prediction variance, and negligible performance loss, the proposed scheme achieves up to 15% spectral efficiency (SE) gain over its counterparts. We further improve this performance by means of an ensemble learning technique for simultaneously training multiple NARX modules in parallel, thus leading to a 23% SE gain. Relying on the predicted beamspace channel, we propose a beamspace analog beam selection technique through fine-tuning the architecture of a pre-trained off-the-shelf GoogleNet, which brings up to 21% SE gain over similar baselines. With the aid of an ensemble learning technique, it is further indicated numerically that up to 34% SE improvement can be achieved, as compared to the counterparts.

Commissioning results of single bunch selection system for the RAON heavy-ion accelerator facility

To enable neutron time-of-flight experiments at the RAON heavy-ion accelerator facility, we tested a single bunch beam selection method by combining an RF chopper and a double gap buncher in the low-energy beam transport section. The RF chopper converts a CW beam into a hundreds-nanosecond pulsed beam. Then, the double gap buncher performs bunching to shorten the pulse length to less than one radio frequency quadrupole (RFQ) cycle. Ideally, a single isolated bunch can be achieved after the RFQ. In this study, we discuss the design concept of the single bunch selection system and present initial beam commissioning results.