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Georges Kaddoum

Publications and source records attributed to Georges Kaddoum.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

Statistical Characterization of RIS-assisted UAV Communications in Terrestrial and Non-Terrestrial Networks Under Channel Aging

This paper studies the statistical characterization of ground-to-air (G2A) and reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted air-to-ground (A2G) communications with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks under the impact of channel aging. We first model the G2A and A2G signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) as non-central complex Gaussian quadratic random variables (RVs) and derive their exact probability density functions, offering a unique characterization for the A2G SNR as the product of two scaled non-central chi-square RVs. Moreover, we also find that, for a large number of RIS elements, the RIS-assisted A2G channel can be characterized as a single Rician fading channel. Our results reveal the presence of channel hardening in A2G communication under low UAV speeds, where we derive the maximum target spectral efficiency (SE) for a system to maintain a consistent required outage level. Meanwhile, high UAV speeds, exceeding 50 m/s, lead to a significant performance degradation, which cannot be mitigated by increasing the number of RIS elements.

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Channel Characterization of UAV-RIS-aided Systems with Adaptive Phase-shift Configuration

This letter considers a UAV aiding communication between a ground transmitter and a ground receiver in the presence of co-channel interference. A discrete-time Markov process is adopted to model the complex nature of the Air-to-Ground (A2G) channel, including the occurrence of Line-of-Sight, Non-Line-of-Sight, and blockage events. Moreover, an adaptive phase-shift-enabled Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface (RIS) is deployed to combat A2G blockage events. Novel frameworks based on the shadowed Rician distribution are proposed to derive closed-form expressions for Ground-to-Air/A2G SINR' distributions. Numerical results show that RISs with large numbers of elements, e.g., 256 RIS elements, improve end-to-end Outage Probability (OP) and reduce blockages.

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Reinforcement Learning-based Relay Selection for Cooperative WSNs in the Presence of Bursty Impulsive Noise

The problem of relay selection is pivotal in the realm of cooperative communication. However, this issue has not been thoroughly examined, particularly when the background noise is assumed to possess an impulsive characteristic with consistent memory as observed in smart grid communications and some other wireless communication scenarios. In this paper, we investigate the impact of this specific type of noise on the performance of cooperative Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) with the Decode and Forward (DF) relaying scheme, considering Symbol-Error-Rate (SER) and battery power consumption fairness across all nodes as the performance metrics. We introduce two innovative relay selection methods that depend on noise state detection and the residual battery power of each relay. The first method encompasses the adaptation of the Max-Min criterion to this specific context, whereas the second employs Reinforcement Learning (RL) to surmount this challenge. Our empirical outcomes demonstrate that the impacts of bursty impulsive noise on the SER performance can be effectively mitigated and that a balance in battery power consumption among all nodes can be established using the proposed methods.

cs.NI↗

User Association Optimization for IRS-aided Terahertz Networks: A Matching Theory Approach

Terahertz (THz) communication is a promising technology for future wireless communications, offering data rates of up to several terabits-per-second (Tbps). However, the range of THz band communications is often limited by high pathloss and molecular absorption. To overcome these challenges, this paper proposes intelligent reconfigurable surfaces (IRSs) to enhance THz communication systems. Specifically, we introduce an angle-based trigonometric channel model to evaluate the effectiveness of IRS-aided THz networks. Additionally, to maximize the sum rate, we formulate the source-IRS-destination matching problem, which is a mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) problem. To solve this non-deterministic polynomial-time hard (NP-hard) problem, the paper proposes a Gale-Shapley-based solution that obtains stable matches between sources and IRSs, as well as between destinations and IRSs in the first and second sub-problems, respectively.

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RIS-Enabled Anti-Interference in LoRa Systems

It has been proved that a long-range (LoRa) system can achieve long-distance and low-power. However, the performance of LoRa systems can be severely degraded by fading. In addition, LoRa technology typically adopts an ALOHA-based access mechanism, which inevitably produces interfering signals for the target user. To overcome the effects of fading and interference, we introduce a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) to LoRa systems. In this context, both non-coherent and coherent detections are considered and their bit error rate (BER) performance analyses are conducted. Moreover, we derive the closed-form BER expressions for the proposed system over Nakagami-m fading channels. Simulation results are used to verify the accuracy of our proposed analytical results. It is shown that the proposed system outperforms the RIS-free LoRa system, and the RIS-aided LoRa system adopting blind transmission. Furthermore, the impacts of the spreading factor (SF), the number of reflecting elements, and the Nakagami-m fading parameters are investigated. It is shown that increasing the number of reflecting elements can remarkably enhance the BER performance, which is an affective measure for the proposed system to balance the trade-off between data rate and coverage range. We further observe that the BER performance of the proposed system is more sensitive to the fading parameter m at high signal-to-noise ratios.

cs.IT↗

Integration of Data Driven Technologies in Smart Grids for Resilient and Sustainable Smart Cities: A Comprehensive Review

A modern-day society demands resilient, reliable, and smart urban infrastructure for effective and in telligent operations and deployment. However, unexpected, high-impact, and low-probability events such as earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, and hurricanes make the design of such robust infrastructure more complex. As a result of such events, a power system infrastructure can be severely affected, leading to unprecedented events, such as blackouts. Nevertheless, the integration of smart grids into the existing framework of smart cities adds to their resilience. Therefore, designing a resilient and reliable power system network is an inevitable requirement of modern smart city infras tructure. With the deployment of the Internet of Things (IoT), smart cities infrastructures have taken a transformational turn towards introducing technologies that do not only provide ease and comfort to the citizens but are also feasible in terms of sustainability and dependability. This paper presents a holistic view of a resilient and sustainable smart city architecture that utilizes IoT, big data analytics, unmanned aerial vehicles, and smart grids through intelligent integration of renew able energy resources. In addition, the impact of disasters on the power system infrastructure is investigated and different types of optimization techniques that can be used to sustain the power flow in the network during disturbances are compared and analyzed. Furthermore, a comparative review analysis of different data-driven machine learning techniques for sustainable smart cities is performed along with the discussion on open research issues and challenges.

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Tutorial-Cum-Survey on Semantic and Goal- Oriented Communication: Research Landscape, Challenges, and Future Directions

SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom are designed to transmit only semantically-relevant information and hence help to minimize power usage, bandwidth consumption, and transmission delay. Consequently, SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom embody a paradigm shift that can change the status quo that wireless connectivity is an opaque data pipe carrying messages whose context-dependent meaning and effectiveness have been ignored. On the other hand, 6G is critical for the materialization of major SemCom use cases (e.g., machine-to-machine SemCom) and major goal-oriented SemCom use cases (e.g., autonomous transportation). The paradigms of \textit{6G for (goal-oriented) SemCom} and \textit{(goal-oriented) SemCom for 6G} call for the tighter integration and marriage of 6G, SemCom, and goal-oriented SemCom. To facilitate this integration and marriage of 6G, SemCom, and goal-oriented SemCom, this comprehensive tutorial-cum-survey paper first explains the fundamentals of semantics and semantic information, semantic representation, theories of semantic information, and definitions of semantic entropy. It then builds on this understanding and details the state-of-the-art research landscape of SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom in terms of their respective algorithmic, theoretical, and realization research frontiers. This paper also exposes the fundamental and major challenges of SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom, and proposes novel future research directions for them in terms of their aforementioned research frontiers. By presenting novel future research directions for SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom along with their corresponding fundamental and major challenges, this tutorial-cum-survey article duly stimulates major streams of research on SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom theory, algorithm, and implementation for 6G and beyond.

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Digital Twinning in Smart Grid Networks: Interplay, Resource Allocation and Use Cases

Motivated by climate change, increasing industrialization and energy reliability concerns, the smart grid is set to revolutionize traditional power systems. Moreover, the exponential annual rise in number of grid-connected users and emerging key players e.g. electric vehicles strain the limited radio resources, which stresses the need for novel and scalable resource management techniques. Digital twin is a cutting-edge virtualization technology that has shown great potential by offering solutions for inherent bottlenecks in traditional wireless networks. In this article, we set the stage for various roles digital twinning can fulfill by optimizing congested radio resources in a proactive and resilient smart grid. Digital twins can help smart grid networks through real-time monitoring, advanced precise modeling and efficient radio resource allocation for normal operations and service restoration following unexpected events. However, reliable real-time communications, intricate abstraction abilities, interoperability with other smart grid technologies, robust computing capabilities and resilient security schemes are some open challenges for future work on digital twins.

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Making Sense of Meaning: A Survey on Metrics for Semantic and Goal-Oriented Communication

Semantic communication (SemCom) aims to convey the meaning behind a transmitted message by transmitting only semantically-relevant information. This semantic-centric design helps to minimize power usage, bandwidth consumption, and transmission delay. SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom (or effectiveness-level SemCom) are therefore promising enablers of 6G and developing rapidly. Despite the surge in their swift development, the design, analysis, optimization, and realization of robust and intelligent SemCom as well as goal-oriented SemCom are fraught with many fundamental challenges. One of the challenges is that the lack of unified/universal metrics of SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom can stifle research progress on their respective algorithmic, theoretical, and implementation frontiers. Consequently, this survey paper documents the existing metrics -- scattered in many references -- of wireless SemCom, optical SemCom, quantum SemCom, and goal-oriented wireless SemCom. By doing so, this paper aims to inspire the design, analysis, and optimization of a wide variety of SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom systems. This article also stimulates the development of unified/universal performance assessment metrics of SemCom and goal-oriented SemCom, as the existing metrics are purely statistical and hardly applicable to reasoning-type tasks that constitute the heart of 6G and beyond.

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Adaptive Decoding Mechanisms for UAV-enabled Double-Uplink Coordinated NOMA

In this paper, we propose a novel adaptive decoding mechanism (ADM) for the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-enabled uplink (UL) non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) communications. Specifically, considering a harsh UAV environment, where ground-to-ground links are regularly unavailable, the proposed ADM overcomes the challenging problem of conventional UL-NOMA systems whose performance is sensitive to the transmitter's statistical channel state information and the receiver's decoding order. To evaluate the performance of the ADM, we derive closed-form expressions for the system outage probability (OP) and system throughput. In the performance analysis section, we provide novel expressions for practical air-to-ground and ground-to-air channels, while taking into account the practical implementation of imperfect successive interference cancellation (SIC) in UL-NOMA. Moreover, the obtained expression can be adopted to characterize the OP of various systems under a Mixture of Gamma (MG) distribution-based fading channels. Next, we propose a sub-optimal Gradient Descent-based algorithm to obtain the power allocation coefficients that result in maximum throughput with respect to each location on UAV's trajectory. To determine the significance of the proposed ADM in nonstationary environments, we consider the ground users and the UAV to move according to the Random Waypoint Mobility (RWM) and Reference Point Group Mobility (RPGM) models, respectively. Accurate formulas for the distance distributions are also provided. Numerical solutions demonstrate that the ADM-enhanced NOMA not only outperforms Orthogonal Multiple Access (OMA), but also improves the performance of UAV-enabled UL-NOMA even in mobile environments.

cs.IT↗

Performance Analysis and Resource Allocation of STAR-RIS Aided Wireless-Powered NOMA System

This paper proposes a simultaneous transmitting and reflecting reconfigurable intelligent surface (STAR-RIS) aided wireless-powered non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) system, which includes an access point (AP), a STAR-RIS, and two non-orthogonal users located at both sides of the STAR-RIS. In this system, the users first harvest the radio-frequency energy from the AP in the downlink, then adopt the harvested energy to transmit information to the AP in the uplink concurrently. Two policies are considered for the proposed system. The first one assumes that the time-switching protocol is used in the downlink while the energy-splitting protocol is adopted in the uplink, named TEP. The second one assumes that the energy-splitting protocol is utilized in both the downlink and uplink, named EEP. The outage probability, sum throughput, and average age of information (AoI) of the proposed system with TEP and EEP are investigated over Nakagami-m fading channels. In addition, we also analyze the outage probability, sum throughput, and average AoI of the STAR-RIS aided wireless-powered time-division-multiple-access (TDMA) system. Simulation and numerical results show that the proposed system with TEP and EEP outperforms baseline schemes, and significantly improves sum throughput performance but reduces outage probability and average AoI performance compared to the STAR-RIS aided wireless-powered TDMA system. Furthermore, to maximize the sum throughput and ensure a certain average AoI, we design a genetic-algorithm based time allocation and power allocation (GA-TAPA) algorithm. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed GA-TAPA method can significantly improve the sum throughput by adaptively adjusting system parameters.

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Metaverse Communications, Networking, Security, and Applications: Research Issues, State-of-the-Art, and Future Directions

Metaverse is an evolving orchestrator of the next-generation Internet architecture that produces an immersive and self-adapting virtual world in which humans perform activities similar to those in the real world, such as playing sports, doing work, and socializing. It is becoming a reality and is driven by ever-evolving advanced technologies such as extended reality, artificial intelligence, and blockchain. In this context, Metaverse will play an essential role in developing smart cities, which becomes more evident in the post COVID 19 pandemic metropolitan setting. However, the new paradigm imposes new challenges, such as developing novel privacy and security threats that can emerge in the digital Metaverse ecosystem. Moreover, it requires the convergence of several media types with the capability to quickly process massive amounts of data to keep the residents safe and well-informed, which can raise issues related to scalability and interoperability. In light of this, this research study aims to review the literature on the state of the art of integrating the Metaverse architecture concepts in smart cities. First, this paper presents the theoretical architecture of Metaverse and discusses international companies interest in this emerging technology. It also examines the notion of Metaverse relevant to virtual reality, identifies the prevalent threats, and determines the importance of communication infrastructure in information gathering for efficient Metaverse operation. Next, the notion of blockchain technologies is discussed regarding privacy preservation and how it can provide tamper-proof content sharing among Metaverse users. Finally, the application of distributed Metaverse for social good is highlighted.

cs.CR↗

Intelligent Reflective Surface Deployment in 6G: A Comprehensive Survey

Intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) are considered a promising technology that can smartly reconfigure the wireless environment to enhance the performance of future wireless networks. However, the deployment of IRSs still faces challenges due to highly dynamic and mobile unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) enabled wireless environments to achieve higher capacity. This paper sheds light on the different deployment strategies for IRSs in future terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks. Specifically, in this paper, we introduce key theoretical concepts underlying the IRS paradigm and discuss the design aspects related to the deployment of IRSs in 6G networks. We also explore optimization-based IRS deployment techniques to improve system performance in terrestrial and aerial IRSs. Furthermore, we survey model-free reinforcement learning (RL) techniques from the deployment aspect to address the challenges of achieving higher capacity in complex and mobile IRS-assisted UAV wireless systems. Finally, we highlight challenges and future research directions from the deployment aspect of IRSs for improving system performance for the future 6G network.

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Performance Analysis of Multi-user NOMA Wireless-Powered mMTC Networks: A Stochastic Geometry Approach

In this paper, we aim to improve the connectivity, scalability, and energy efficiency of machine-type communication (MTC) networks with different types of MTC devices (MTCDs), namely Type-I and Type-II MTCDs, which have different communication purposes. To this end, we propose two transmission schemes called connectivity-oriented machine-type communication (CoM) and quality-oriented machine-type communication (QoM), which take into account the stochastic geometry-based deployment and the random active/inactive status of MTCDs. Specifically, in the proposed schemes, the active Type-I MTCDs operate using a novel Bernoulli random process-based simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) architecture. Next, utilizing multi-user power-domain non-orthogonal multiple access (PD-NOMA), each active Type-I MTCD can simultaneously communicate with another Type-I MTCD and a scalable number of Type-II MTCDs. In the performance analysis of the proposed schemes, we prove that the true distribution of the received power at a Type-II MTCD in the QoM scheme can be approximated by the Singh-Maddala distribution. Exploiting this unique statistical finding, we derive approximate closed-form expressions for the outage probability (OP) and sum-throughput of massive MTC (mMTC) networks. Through numerical results, we show that the proposed schemes provide a considerable sum-throughput gain over conventional mMTC networks.

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Recurrent Neural Network-based Anti-jamming Framework for Defense Against Multiple Jamming Policies

Conventional anti-jamming methods mainly focus on preventing single jammer attacks with an invariant jamming policy or jamming attacks from multiple jammers with similar jamming policies. These anti-jamming methods are ineffective against a single jammer following several different jamming policies or multiple jammers with distinct policies. Therefore, this paper proposes an anti-jamming method that can adapt its policy to the current jamming attack. Moreover, for the multiple jammers scenario, an anti-jamming method that estimates the future occupied channels using the jammers' occupied channels in previous time slots is proposed. In both single and multiple jammers scenarios, the interaction between the users and jammers is modeled using recurrent neural networks (RNN)s. The performance of the proposed anti-jamming methods is evaluated by calculating the users' successful transmission rate (STR) and ergodic rate (ER), and compared to a baseline based on Q-learning (DQL). Simulation results show that for the single jammer scenario, all the considered jamming policies are perfectly detected and high STR and ER are maintained. Moreover, when 70 % of the spectrum is under jamming attacks from multiple jammers, the proposed method achieves an STR and ER greater than 75 % and 80 %, respectively. These values rise to 90 % when 30 % of the spectrum is under jamming attacks. In addition, the proposed anti-jamming methods significantly outperform the DQL method for all the considered cases and jamming scenarios.

cs.LG↗

Mobility Management in 5G and Beyond: A Novel Smart Handover with Adaptive Time-to-Trigger and Hysteresis Margin

The 5th Generation (5G) New Radio (NR) and beyond technologies will support enhanced mobile broadband, very low latency communications, and huge numbers of mobile devices. Therefore, for very high speed users, seamless mobility needs to be maintained during the migration from one cell to another in the handover. Due to the presence of a massive number of mobile devices, the management of the high mobility of a dense network becomes crucial. Moreover, a dynamic adaptation is required for the Time-to-Trigger (TTT) and hysteresis margin, which significantly impact the handover latency and overall throughput. Therefore, in this paper, we propose an online learning-based mechanism, known as Learning-based Intelligent Mobility Management (LIM2), for mobility management in 5G and beyond, with an intelligent adaptation of the TTT and hysteresis values. LIM2 uses a Kalman filter to predict the future signal quality of the serving and neighbor cells, selects the target cell for the handover using state-action-reward-state-action (SARSA)-based reinforcement learning, and adapts the TTT and hysteresis using the epsilon-greedy policy. We implement a prototype of the LIM2 in NS-3 and extensively analyze its performance, where it is observed that the LIM2 algorithm can significantly improve the handover operation in very high speed mobility scenarios.

cs.NI↗

Physical Layer Security of RIS-Assisted Communications under Electromagnetic Interference

This work investigates the impact of the ever-present electromagnetic interference (EMI) on the achievable secrecy performance of reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-aided communication systems. We characterize the end-to-end RIS channel by considering key practical aspects such as spatial correlation, transmit beamforming vector, phase-shift noise, the coexistence of direct and indirect channels, and the presence of strong/mild EMI on the receiver sides. We show that the effect of EMI on secrecy performance strongly depends on the ability of the eavesdropper to cancel such interference; this puts forth the potential of EMI-based attacks to degrade physical layer security in RIS-aided communications.

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IBAC: An Intelligent Dynamic Bandwidth Channel Access Avoiding Outside Warning Range Problem

IEEE 802.11ax uses the concept of primary and secondary channels, leading to the Dynamic Bandwidth Channel Access (DBCA) mechanism. By applying DBCA, a wireless station can select a wider channel bandwidth, such as 40/80/160 MHz, by applying the channel bonding feature. However, during channel bonding, inappropriate bandwidth selection can cause collisions. Therefore, to avoid collisions, a well-developed media access control (MAC) protocol is crucial to effectively utilize the channel bonding mechanism. In this paper, we address a collision scenario, called Outside Warning Range Problem (OWRP), that may occur during DBCA when a wireless station interferes with another wireless station after channel bonding is performed. Therefore, we propose a MAC layer mechanism, Intelligent Bonding Avoiding Collision (IBAC), that adapts the channel bonding level in DBCA in order to avoid the OWRP. We first design a theoretical model based on Markov chains for DBCA while avoiding the OWRP. Based on this model, we design a Thompson sampling based Bayesian approach to select the best possible channel bonding level intelligently. We analyze the performance of the IBAC through simulations where it is observed that, comparing to other competing mechanisms, the proposed approach can enhance the network performance significantly while avoiding the OWRP.

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