mmWave Communications in the Built Environment

Wavecomb is a MSCA-ITN-EID Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions project, funded by the European Union’s reference programme for doctoral education and postdoctoral training, starting October 2017 and ending September 21. 

The foreseen exponential growth of mobile data traffic will not be uniform across geographical areas, but is mainly concentrated in hot spots that are usually located in the built environments (BEs) such as central business districts, stations, airports, stadiums, dense urban environments, etc. This poses considerable challenges that we believe can be solved by ultra dense deployment of millimetre-wave (mmW) small-cells (SCs) in conjunction with massive multiple-input multipleoutput (MIMO) in 5G and beyond 5G (B5G) wireless networks. However, there are a number of research challenges that need to be addressed for a successful deployment of 5G/B5G wireless networks: even if the theoretical background of massive MIMO is by now rather complete, the actual performance characterization and measurements of mmW antenna arrays has not yet been fully addressed at either the component or system level; mmW radio channel measurements have been performed but with limited time delay resolution, single antennas and over single radio links; and mmW bands have been considered for mobile communications, but the level of detail and diversity of BEs necessary for meaningful mmW SC deployment has not been fully exploited. Therefore, the team combines three disruptive key enabling technologies for 5G/B5G with the aim to answer fundamental questions that are still not well understood.

For more information visit the webpage of the consortium.