The speed of wired optical fiber technology is soon reaching 1 million megabits per second, also known as 1 terabit/s. Wireless technology is improving at the same pace but is 10 years behind in speed, thus we can expect to reach 1 terabit/s over wireless during the next decade. In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson discuss these expected developments with a focus on the potential use cases and how to reach these immense speeds in different frequency bands – from 1 GHz to 200 GHz. Their own thoughts are mixed with insights gathered at a recent workshop at TU Berlin. Major research challenges remain, particularly related to algorithms, transceiver hardware, and decoding complexity. Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

Research is carried out to obtain new knowledge, find solutions to pertinent problems, and challenge the researchers’ abilities. Two key aspects of the scientific process are reproducibility and replicability, which sound similar but are distinctly different. In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson discuss these principles and their impact on wireless communication research. The conversation covers the replication crisis, Monte Carlo simulations, best practices, pitfalls that new researchers should avoid, and what the community can become better at. The following article is mentioned: “Reproducible Research: Best Practices and Potential Misuse” (https://arxiv.org/pdf/1905.00645.pdf). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

Information theory is the research discipline that establishes the fundamental limits for information transfer, storage, and processing. Major advances in wireless communications have often been a combination of information-theoretic predictions and engineering efforts that turn them into mainstream technology. Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson invited the information-theorist Giuseppe Caire, Professor at TU Berlin, to discuss how the discipline is shaping current and future wireless networks. The conversation first covers the journey from classical multiuser information theory to Massive MIMO technology in 5G. The rest of the episode goes through potential future developments that can be assessed through information theory: distributed MIMO, orthogonal time-frequency-space (OTFS) modulation, coded caching, reconfigurable intelligent surfaces, terahertz bands, and the use of ever larger numbers of antennas. The following papers are mentioned: “OTFS vs. OFDM in the Presence of Sparsity: A Fair Comparison” (https://doi.org/10.1109/TWC.2021.3129975) , “Joint Spatial Division and Multiplexing”(https://arxiv.org/pdf/1209.1402.pdf), and “Massive MIMO has Unlimited Capacity” (https://arxiv.org/pdf/1705.00538.pdf). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

A wave of digitalization is sweeping over the world, but not everything benefits from a transformation from analog to digital methods. In this episode, Emil Björnson and Erik G. Larsson discuss the fundamentals of analog modulation techniques to pinpoint their key advantages. Particular attention is given to how analog modulation enables over-the-air aggregation of data, which can be used for computations, efficient federated training of machine learning models, and distributed hypothesis testing. The conversation covers the need for coherent operation and power control and outlines the challenges that researchers are now facing when extending the methods to multi-antenna systems. Towards the end, the following paper is mentioned: “Optimal MIMO Combining for Blind Federated Edge Learning with Gradient Sparsification” (https://arxiv.org/pdf/2203.12957.pdf). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

Many assumptions must be made when simulating a communication link, including the modulation format, channel coding, multi-antenna transmission scheme, receiver processing, and channel modeling. In this episode, Emil Björnson and Erik G. Larsson are visited by Jakob Hoydis, Principal Research Scientist at NVIDIA, to discuss the fundamentals of link-level simulations. Jakob has led the development of the new open-source simulator Sionna, which is particularly well suited for machine learning research. The conversation covers the needs and means for making accurate simulations, channel modeling, reproducibility, and how machine learning can be used to improve standard algorithms. Other topics that are discussed are MIMO decoding and technical debt. Sionna can be downloaded from https://nvlabs.github.io/sionna/ and the white paper that is mentioned in the episode is found here: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2203.11854.pdf Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

The research towards 6G is intense and many new technology components are being proposed by academia and industry. In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson identify the key selling points of six of these 6G technologies. They discuss the potential for major breakthroughs and what the main challenges are. The episode covers: 1) Semantic communications; 2) Distributed/cell-free Massive MIMO; 3) Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces; 4) Full-duplex radios; 5) Joint communication and sensing; and 6) Orbital Angular Momentum (OAM). The following paper is mentioned: “Is Orbital Angular Momentum (OAM) Based Radio Communication an Unexploited Area?” by Edfors and Johansson (https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/ws/files/4023050/2339120.pdf). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

The reliability of an application is determined by its weakest link, which often is the wireless link. Channel coding and retransmissions are traditionally used to enhance reliability but at the cost of extra latency. 5G promises to enhance both reliability and latency in a new operational mode called ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC). In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson discuss URLLC with Petar Popovski, Professor at Aalborg University, Denmark. The conversation pinpoints the physical reasons for latency and unreliability, and viable solutions related to network deployment, diversity, digital vs. analog communications, non-orthogonal network slicing, and machine learning. Further details can be found in the article “Wireless Access in Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communication (URLLC)” (https://doi.org/10.1109/TCOMM.2019.2914652) and its companion video (https://youtu.be/XGbe_ckKKpE). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

Mobile network technology builds on open standards, but it is nevertheless a major effort to implement the required software protocols and interface them with actual hardware. Many algorithmic choices must also be made in the implementation, leading to each vendor having its proprietary solution. The OpenAirInterface Alliance wants to change the game by providing open-source software implementations of the wireless air interface and core network. In this episode, Emil Björnson and Erik G. Larsson are discussing these prospects with a Board Member of the Alliance: Florian Kaltenberger, Associate Professor at EURECOM, France. The conversation covers the fundamentals of air interfaces, how anyone can build a 5G network using their open-source software and off-the-shelf hardware, and the pros and cons of implementing everything in software. The connections to Open RAN, functional splits, and patent licenses are also discussed. Further details can be found at https://openairinterface.org and in the paper “OpenAirInterface: Democratizing innovation in the 5G Era” (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comnet.2020.107284). Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

In the near future, we will be able to deploy new wireless networks without installing new physical infrastructure. The networks will instead be virtualized on shared hardware using the new concept of network slicing. This will enable tailored wireless services for businesses, entertainment, and devices with special demands. In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson discuss why we need multiple virtual networks, what the practical services might be, who will pay for it, and whether the concept might break net neutrality. The episode starts with a continued discussion on the usefulness of models, based on feedback from listeners regarding Episode 25. The network slicing topic starts after 10 minutes. Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/

In the near future, we will be able to deploy new wireless networks without installing new physical infrastructure. The networks will instead be virtualized on shared hardware using the new concept of network slicing. This will enable tailored wireless services for businesses, entertainment, and devices with special demands. In this episode, Erik G. Larsson and Emil Björnson discuss why we need multiple virtual networks, what the practical services might be, who will pay for it, and whether the concept might break net neutrality. The episode starts with a continued discussion on the usefulness of models, based on feedback from listeners regarding Episode 25. The network slicing topic starts after 10 minutes. Music: On the Verge by Joseph McDade. Visit Erik’s website https://liu.se/en/employee/erila39 and Emil’s website https://ebjornson.com/