arXiv subjects

Xuesong Cai

Publications and source records attributed to Xuesong Cai.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2025

Multi-Modal Intelligent Channel Modeling Framework for 6G-Enabled Networked Intelligent Systems

The design and technology development of 6G-enabled networked intelligent systems needs an accurate real-time channel model as the cornerstone. However, with the new requirements of 6G-enabled networked intelligent systems, the conventional channel modeling methods face many limitations. Fortunately, the multi-modal sensors equipped on the intelligent agents bring timely opportunities, i.e., the intelligent integration and mutually beneficial mechanism between communications and multi-modal sensing could be investigated based on the artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. In this case, the mapping relationship between physical environment and electromagnetic channel could be explored via Synesthesia of Machines (SoM). This article presents a novel multi-modal intelligent channel modeling (MMICM) framework for 6G-enabled networked intelligent systems, which establishes a nonlinear model between multi-modal sensing and channel characteristics, including large-scale and small-scale channel characteristics. The architecture and features of proposed intelligent modeling framework are expounded and the key technologies involved are also analyzed. Finally, the system-engaged applications and potential research directions of MMICM framework are outlined.

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arXiv2025

Illuminating the Path: Attention-Assisted Beamforming and Predictive Insights in 5G NR Systems

Artificial intelligence advances have recently influenced wireless communications, including beam management in fifth-generation (5G) new radio systems. AI-driven models and algorithms are being applied to enhance tasks such as beam selection, prediction, and refinement by leveraging real-time and historical data. These approaches address challenges such as mobility under complex channel conditions, showing promising results compared to traditional methods. Beam management in 5G refers to processes that ensure optimal alignment between the base station and user equipment for effective signal transmission and reception based on real-time channel state information and user positioning. This study leverages accurate beam prediction to identify a smaller subset of beams, resulting in a more efficient, streamlined, and link-adaptive communication system. The innovative approach presented introduces a precise, attention-based prediction model that derives the entire downlink transmission chain in a commercial grade 5G system. The predicted downlink beams are specifically tailored to handle the complexities of none line-of-sight environments known for high-dimensional channel dynamics and scatterer-induced signal variations. This novel method introduces a paradigm shift in utilizing environmental and channel dynamics in contrast to conventional procedures of beam management, which entails complex methods involving exhaustive techniques to predict the best beams. The presented beam prediction results demonstrate robustness in addressing the challenges posed by signal-dispersive environments, showcasing great potential in mobility scenarios.

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arXiv2025

Interacting Object-Enabled Clustering and Characterization of Distributed MIMO Channels

Distributed multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), also known as cell-free massive MIMO, emerges as a promising technology for sixth-generation (6G) systems to support uniform coverage and reliable communication. For the design and optimization of such systems, measurement-based investigations of real-world distributed MIMO channels are essential. In this paper, we present an indoor channel measurement campaign, featuring eight distributed antenna arrays with 128 elements in total. Multi-link channels are measured at 50 positions along a 12-meter user route. A clustering algorithm enabled by interacting objects is proposed to identify clusters in the measured channels. The algorithm jointly clusters the multipath components for all links, effectively capturing the dynamic contributions of common clusters to different links. In addition, a Kalman filter-based tracking framework is introduced for cluster prediction, tracking, and updating along the user movement. Using the clustering and tracking results, cluster-level characterization of the measured channels is performed. First, the number of clusters and their visibility at both link ends are analyzed. Next, a maximum-likelihood estimator is utilized to determine the entire cluster visibility region length. Finally, key cluster-level properties, including the common cluster ratio, cluster power, shadowing, spread, among others, are statistically investigated. The results provide valuable insights into cluster behavior in typical multi-link channels, necessary for accurate modeling of distributed MIMO channels.

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arXiv2025

Joint Near-Field Sensing and Visibility Region Detection with Extremely Large Aperture Arrays

In this paper, we consider near-field localization and sensing with an extremely large aperture array under partial blockage of array antennas, where spherical wavefront and spatial non-stationarity are accounted for. We propose an Ising model to characterize the clustered sparsity feature of the blockage pattern, develop an algorithm based on alternating optimization for joint channel parameter estimation and visibility region detection, and further estimate the locations of the user and environmental scatterers. The simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm compared to conventional methods.

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arXiv2024

Spatial separation of closely-spaced users in measured distributed massive MIMO channels

Aiming for the sixth generation (6G) wireless communications, distributed massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems hold significant potential for spatial multiplexing. In order to evaluate the ability of a distributed massive MIMO system to spatially separate closely spaced users, this paper presents an indoor channel measurement campaign. The measurements are carried out at a carrier frequency of 5.6 GHz with a bandwidth of 400 MHz, employing distributed antenna arrays with a total of 128 elements. Multiple scalar metrics are selected to evaluate spatial separability in line-of-sight, non line-of-sight, and mixed conditions. Firstly, through studying the singular value spread, it is shown that in line-of-sight conditions, better user orthogonality is achieved with a distributed MIMO setup compared to a co-located MIMO array. Furthermore, the dirty-paper coding (DPC) capacity and zero forcing (ZF) precoding sum-rate capacities are investigated across varying numbers of antennas and their topologies. The results show that in all three conditions, the less complex ZF precoder can be applied in distributed massive MIMO systems while still achieving a large fraction of the DPC capacity. Additionally, in line-of-sight conditions, both sum-rate capacities and user fairness benefit from more antennas and a more distributed antenna topology. However, in the given NLoS condition, the improvement in spatial separability through distributed antenna topologies is limited.

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arXiv2024

Hybrid Precoder Design for Angle-of-Departure Estimation with Limited-Resolution Phase Shifters

Hybrid analog-digital beamforming stands out as a key enabler for future communication systems with a massive number of antennas. In this paper, we investigate the hybrid precoder design problem for angle-of-departure (AoD) estimation, where we take into account the practical constraint on the limited resolution of phase shifters. Our goal is to design a radio-frequency (RF) precoder and a base-band (BB) precoder to estimate AoD of the user with a high accuracy. To this end, we propose a two-step strategy where we first obtain the fully digital precoder that minimizes the angle error bound, and then the resulting digital precoder is decomposed into an RF precoder and a BB precoder, based on the alternating optimization and the alternating direction method of multipliers. Besides, we derive the quantization error upper bound and analyse the convergence behavior of the proposed algorithm. Numerical results demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed method over state-of-the-art baselines.

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arXiv2024

Dynamic User Grouping based on Location and Heading in 5G NR Systems

User grouping based on geographic location in fifth generation (5G) New Radio (NR) systems has several applications that can significantly improve network performance, user experience, and service delivery. We demonstrate how Sounding Reference Signals channel fingerprints can be used for dynamic user grouping in a 5G NR commercial deployment based on outdoor positions and heading direction employing machine learning methods such as neural networks combined with clustering methods.

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arXiv2024

Attention-aided Outdoor Localization in Commercial 5G NR Systems

The integration of high-precision cellular localization and machine learning (ML) is considered a cornerstone technique in future cellular navigation systems, offering unparalleled accuracy and functionality. This study focuses on localization based on uplink channel measurements in a fifth-generation (5G) new radio (NR) system. An attention-aided ML-based single-snapshot localization pipeline is presented, which consists of several cascaded blocks, namely a signal processing block, an attention-aided block, and an uncertainty estimation block. Specifically, the signal processing block generates an impulse response beam matrix for all beams. The attention-aided block trains on the channel impulse responses using an attention-aided network, which captures the correlation between impulse responses for different beams. The uncertainty estimation block predicts the probability density function of the UE position, thereby also indicating the confidence level of the localization result. Two representative uncertainty estimation techniques, the negative log-likelihood and the regression-by-classification techniques, are applied and compared. Furthermore, for dynamic measurements with multiple snapshots available, we combine the proposed pipeline with a Kalman filter to enhance localization accuracy. To evaluate our approach, we extract channel impulse responses for different beams from a commercial base station. The outdoor measurement campaign covers Line-of-Sight (LoS), Non-Line-of-Sight (NLoS), and a mix of LoS and NLoS scenarios. The results show that sub-meter localization accuracy can be achieved.

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arXiv2024

Channel Performance Metrics and Evaluation for XR Head-Mounted Displays with mmWave Arrays

Millimeter-wave (mmWave) technology holds the potential to revolutionize head-mounted displays (HMDs) by enabling high-speed wireless communication with nearby processing nodes, where complex video rendering can take place. However, the sparse angular profile of mmWave channels, coupled with the narrow field of view (FoV) of patch-antenna arrays and frequent HMD rotation, can lead to poor performance. We introduce six channel performance metrics to evaluate the performance of an HMD equipped with mmWave arrays. We analyze the metrics using analytical models, discuss their impact for the application, and apply them to 28 GHz channel sounding data, collected in a conference room using eight HMD patch-antenna arrays, offset by 45 degrees from each other in azimuth. Our findings confirm that a single array performs poorly due to the narrow FoV, and featuring multiple arrays along the HMD's azimuth is required. Namely, the broader FoV stabilizes channel gain during HMD rotation, lessens the attenuation caused by line of sight (LoS) obstruction, and increases the channel's spatial multiplexing capability. In light of our findings, we conclude that it is imperative to either equip the HMD with multiple arrays or, as an alternative approach, incorporate macroscopic diversity by leveraging distributed access point (AP) infrastructure.

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arXiv2024

A Wideband Distributed Massive MIMO Channel Sounder for Communication and Sensing

Channel sounding is a vital step in understanding wireless channels for the design and deployment of wireless communication systems. In this paper, we present the design and implementation of a coherent distributed massive MIMO channel sounder operating at 5-6 GHz with a bandwidth of 400 MHz based on the NI USRP X410. Through the integration of transceiver chains and RF switches, the design facilitates the use of a larger number of antennas without significant compromise in dynamic capability. Our current implementation is capable of measuring thousands of antenna combinations within tens of milliseconds. Every radio frequency switch is seamlessly integrated with a 16-element antenna array, making the antennas more practical to be transported and flexibly distributed. In addition, the channel sounder features real-time processing to reduce the data stream to the host computer and increase the signal-to-noise ratio. The design and implementation are verified through two measurements in an indoor laboratory environment. The first measurement entails a single-antenna robot as transmitter and 128 distributed receiving antennas. The second measurement demonstrates a passive sensing scenario with a walking person. We evaluate the results of both measurements using the super-resolution algorithm SAGE. The results demonstrate the great potential of the presented sounding system for providing high-quality radio channel measurements, contributing to high-resolution channel estimation, characterization, and active and passive sensing in realistic and dynamic scenarios.

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arXiv2024

A Belief Propagation Algorithm for Multipath-based SLAM with Multiple Map Features: A mmWave MIMO Application

In this paper, we present a multipath-based simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) algorithm that continuously adapts mulitiple map feature (MF) models describing specularly reflected multipath components (MPCs) from flat surfaces and point-scattered MPCs, respectively. We develop a Bayesian model for sequential detection and estimation of interacting MF model parameters, MF states and mobile agent's state including position and orientation. The Bayesian model is represented by a factor graph enabling the use of belief propagation (BP) for efficient computation of the marginal posterior distributions. The algorithm also exploits amplitude information enabling reliable detection of weak MFs associated with MPCs of very low signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs). The performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated using real millimeter-wave (mmWave) multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) measurements with single base station setup. Results demonstrate the excellent localization and mapping performance of the proposed algorithm in challenging dynamic outdoor scenarios.

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arXiv2024

Impact of Array Configuration on Head-Mounted Display Performance at mmWave Bands

Immersing a user in life-like extended reality (XR) scenery using a head-mounted display (HMD) with a constrained form factor and hardware complexity requires remote rendering on a nearby edge server or computer. Millimeter-wave (mmWave) communication technology can provide sufficient data rate for wireless XR content transmission. However, mmWave channels exhibit severe sparsity in the angular domain. This means that distributed antenna arrays are required to cover a larger angular area and to combat outage during HMD rotation. At the same time, one would prefer fewer antenna elements/arrays for a lower complexity system. Therefore, it is important to evaluate the trade-off between the number of antenna arrays and the achievable performance to find a proper practical solution. This work presents indoor 28 GHz mmWave channel measurement data, collected during HMD mobility, and studies the dominant eigenmode (DE) gain. DE gain is a significant factor in understanding system performance since mmWave channel sparsity and eigenmode imbalance often results in provisioning the majority of the available power to the DE. Moreover, it provides the upper performance bounds for widely-adopted analog beamformers. We propose 3 performance metrics - gain trade-off, gain volatility, and minimum service trade-off - for evaluating the performance of a multi-array HMD and apply the metrics to indoor 28 GHz channel measurement data. Evaluation results indicate, that 3 arrays provide stable temporal channel gain. Adding a 4th array further increases channel capacity, while any additional arrays do not significantly increase physical layer performance.

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arXiv2023

Vision-Based Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface Beam Tracking for mmWave Communications

Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces have emerged as a technology with the potential to enhance wireless communication performance for 5G and beyond. However, the technology comes with challenges in areas such as complexity, power consumption, and cost. This paper demonstrates a computer vision-based reconfigurable intelligent surface beamforming algorithm that addresses complexity and cost issues and analyzes the multipath components that arise from the insertion of such a device into the wireless channel. The results show that a reconfigurable intelligent surface can provide an additional multipath component. The power of this additional path can be critical in blockage scenarios, and a capacity increase can be perceived in both line-of-sight and non line-of-sight scenarios.

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arXiv2023

A Hybrid Antenna Switching Scheme for Dynamic Channel Sounding

Channel sounding is essential for the development of radio systems. One flexible strategy is the switched-array-based channel sounding, where antenna elements are activated at different time instants to measure the channel spatial characteristics. Although its hardware complexity is decreased due to fewer radio-frequency (RF) chains, sequentially switching the antenna elements can result in aliasing in the joint estimation of angles and Doppler frequencies of multipath components (MPCs). Therefore, pseudo-random switching has been proposed to mitigate such aliasing and increase estimation accuracy in both angular and Doppler domains. Nevertheless, the increased Doppler resolution could cause additional post-processing complexity of parameter estimation, which is relevant when the Doppler frequencies are not of interest, e.g., for spatial channel modeling. This paper proposes an improved hybrid sequential and random switching scheme. The primary purpose is to maintain the estimation accuracy of angles of MPCs while decreasing the resolution of Doppler frequencies for minimized complexity of channel parameter estimation. A simulated-annealing algorithm is exploited to obtain an optimized switching sequence. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is also demonstrated with a realistic antenna array.

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arXiv2023

Enhanced Effective Aperture Distribution Function for Characterizing Large-Scale Antenna Arrays

Accurate characterization of large-scale antenna arrays is growing in importance and complexity for the fifth-generation (5G) and beyond systems, as they feature more antenna elements and require increased overall performance. The full 3D patterns of all antenna elements in the array need to be characterized because they are in general different due to construction inaccuracy, coupling, antenna array's asymmetry, etc. The effective aperture distribution function (EADF) can provide an analytic description of an antenna array based on a full-sphere measurement of the array in an anechoic chamber. However, as the array aperture increases, denser spatial samples are needed for EADF due to large distance offsets of array elements from the reference point in the anechoic chamber, leading to a prohibitive measurement time and increased complexity of EADF. In this paper, we present the EADF applied to large-scale arrays and highlight issues caused by the large array aperture. To overcome the issues, an enhanced EADF is proposed with a low complexity that is intrinsically determined by the characteristic of each array element rather than the array aperture. The enhanced EADF is validated using experimental measurements conducted at 27-30 GHz frequency band with a relatively large planar array.

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arXiv2023

High-Precision Machine-Learning Based Indoor Localization with Massive MIMO System

High-precision cellular-based localization is one of the key technologies for next-generation communication systems. In this paper, we investigate the potential of applying machine learning (ML) to a massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system to enhance localization accuracy. We analyze a new ML-based localization pipeline that has two parallel fully connected neural networks (FCNN). The first FCNN takes the instantaneous spatial covariance matrix to capture angular information, while the second FCNN takes the channel impulse responses to capture delay information. We fuse the estimated coordinates of these two FCNNs for further accuracy improvement. To test the localization algorithm, we performed an indoor measurement campaign with a massive MIMO testbed at 3.7GHz. In the measured scenario, the proposed pipeline can achieve centimeter-level accuracy by combining delay and angular information.

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arXiv2023

Toward 6G with Terahertz Communications: Understanding the Propagation Channels

This article aims at providing insights for a comprehensive understanding of terahertz (THz) propagation channels. Specifically, we discuss essential THz channel characteristics to be well understood for the success of THz communications. The methodology of establishing realistic and 6G-compliant THz channel models based on measurements is then elaborated on, followed by a discussion on existing THz channel measurements in the literature. Finally, future research directions, challenges and measures to enrich the understanding of THz channels are discussed.

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arXiv2023

Power Allocation for Uplink Communications of Massive Cellular-Connected UAVs

Cellular-connected unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has attracted a surge of research interest in both academia and industry. To support aerial user equipment (UEs) in the existing cellular networks, one promising approach is to assign a portion of the system bandwidth exclusively to the UAV-UEs. This is especially favorable for use cases where a large number of UAV-UEs are exploited, e.g., for package delivery close to a warehouse. Although the nearly line-of-sight (LoS) channels can result in higher powers received, UAVs can in turn cause severe interference to each other in the same frequency band. In this contribution, we focus on the uplink communications of massive cellular-connected UAVs. Different power allocation algorithms are proposed to either maximize the minimal spectrum efficiency (SE) or maximize the overall SE to cope with severe interference based on the successive convex approximation (SCA) principle. One of the challenges is that a UAV can affect a large area meaning that many more UAV-UEs must be considered in the optimization problem, which is essentially different from that for terrestrial UEs. The necessity of single-carrier uplink transmission further complicates the problem. Nevertheless, we find that the special property of large coherent bandwidths and coherent times of the propagation channels can be leveraged. The performances of the proposed algorithms are evaluated via extensive simulations in the full-buffer transmission mode and bursty-traffic mode. Results show that the proposed algorithms can effectively enhance the uplink SEs. This work can be considered the first attempt to deal with the interference among massive cellular-connected UAV-UEs with optimized power allocations.

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