arXiv subjects

Gabriel M. Almeida

Publications and source records attributed to Gabriel M. Almeida.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Towards Energy- and QoS-aware Load Balancing for 5G Advanced: Leveraging O-RAN to Achieve Sustainability and Energy Efficiency

The increasing energy consumption of next-generation mobile networks necessitates the adoption of autonomous and energy-aware management strategies. This article proposes a novel adaptive solution leveraging the O-RAN architecture to optimize energy efficiency while managing its trade-off with QoS. The proposed approach introduces a hierarchical O-RAN-aligned control framework in which a Non-RT RIC periodically computes energy-aware policies from long-term historical data, while a Near-RT RIC enforces those policies through per-UE handover actions on a sub-second timescale. We formulate a joint energy- and QoS-aware load balancing problem as a MINLP model. This model optimizes UE association across O-RUs to minimize transmission power and autonomously deactivate underutilized cells, while enforcing per-UE throughput requirements as explicit constraints at each optimization cycle. To validate the proposed solution, we deploy it in an experimental environment that simulates massive sports events. Experimental results demonstrate 72% energy savings over a 24-hour trace and sub-second handover delays (0.123-0.204 s/UE), confirming the solution's feasibility for autonomous and sustainable 5G Advanced networks. An offline physical-layer throughput evaluation further characterizes the trade-off between energy efficiency and QoS, establishing the operational limits of dynamic cell deactivations. This work provides guidelines for deploying energy-efficient strategies in O-RAN environments and underscores the potential of adaptive solutions for sustainable mobile communications.

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arXiv2025

Adaptive Reallocation of RAN Functions for Resilient 6G Networks

The disaggregation of base stations into discrete RAN functions introduces new threats to mobile networks, as failures in one RAN function can trigger cascading failures and disrupt the entire functional chain, impacting network performance and leading to outages. In this paper, we propose the first resilience mechanism leveraging the adaptive placement of RAN functions to mitigate disruptions and recover service continuity in the presence of compromised infrastructure. Our model detects disrupted RUs due to cascading failures, reacts by re-instantiating CU and DU in alternative cloud locations, and recovers service continuity by reestablishing functional chains. We formulate this recovery process as an optimization problem that maximizes post-failure network performance while considering computational and communication constraints of the infrastructure. We numerically evaluated our approach on a real-world mobile network topology under multiple failure scenarios, and demonstrated that our solution recovers up to 70% higher throughput compared to conventional resilience mechanisms.

cs.NI↗

arXiv2023

RIC-O: Efficient placement of a disaggregated and distributed RAN Intelligent Controller with dynamic clustering of radio nodes

The Radio Access Network (RAN) is the segment of cellular networks that provides wireless connectivity to end-users. O-RAN Alliance has been transforming the RAN industry by proposing open RAN specifications and the programmable Non-Real-Time and Near-Real-Time RAN Intelligent Controllers (Non-RT RIC and Near-RT RIC). Both RICs provide platforms for running applications called rApps and xApps, respectively, to optimize the behavior of the RAN. We investigate a disaggregation strategy of the Near-RT RIC so that its components meet stringent latency requirements while presenting a cost-effective solution. We propose the novel RIC Orchestrator (RIC-O) that optimizes the deployment of the Near-RT RIC components across the cloud-edge continuum. Edge computing nodes often present limited resources and are expensive compared to cloud computing. For example, in the O-RAN Signalling Storm Protection, Near-RT RIC is expected to support end-to-end control loop latencies as low as 10ms. Therefore, performance-critical components of Near-RT RIC and certain xApps should run at the edge while other components can run on the cloud. Furthermore, RIC-O employs an efficient strategy to react to sudden changes and re-deploy components dynamically. We evaluate our proposal through analytical modeling and real-world experiments in an extended Kubernetes deployment implementing RIC-O and disaggregated Near-RT RIC.

cs.NI↗