A 5G FRONTHAUL FOR CONVERGED NETWORKS

Transcription

1 Philippos Assimakopoulos, Communications Research Group, University of Kent A 5G FRONTHAUL FOR CONVERGED NETWORKS This project has received funding from the European Union s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No (icirs)

2 The icirs project icirs: intelligent Converged network consolidating Radio and optical access around USer equipment Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin. 11-partner Horizon 2020 ICT project in Future Networks theme Start date: 1 January, months MEuros. Coordinator: UniKent Partners: University of Kent, ADVA Optical Networking, Orange, Telekom Slovenije, Primetel, Wellness Telecom, HHI, University of Essex, JDSU, IAF GmbH, IDCC

3 The concept Will discuss some of the details later, but key are: 1. Ethernet in fronthaul 2. Intelligent operation then brought to fronthaul 3. Added intelligence for D2D and hetnet operation 4. Centralised functions available to mobile cloud processing C-RAN important for 5G D2D, mm-wave, mobile cloud important for 5G

4 Wireless-fibre communications: C-RAN and the fronthaul Require shorter wireless distances for high data-rate services, and so less users are sharing available bandwidth. Two approaches: Small co-operating cells or distributed antennas/remote radio heads Small cells: Mode of operation clearer (scales from current provision). Lots of backhaul links. Cooperation between cells more limited. Distributed antennas/remote radio heads: Co-operation for beamforming, ICI, coordinated multipoint fundamentally more achievable. C-RAN BBU pooling permits greater network function virtualization. High demands on fibre distribution network.

5 Challenges for the fronthaul Current preferred solution is sampled radio waveform transport: CPRI/ORI Specific solution for fronthaul convergence? TDM streams how to utilize bandwidth of converged network efficiently? OAM, SON etc? Bit-rates! Current CPRI/ORI interfaces Projected requirements Line rate Example Use Possible uses Approx. line rate* Mb/s 10 MHz LTE channel, with 8B10B encoding 100 MHz, 8 antennas (sectors/mimo/comp) 28 Gb/s Gb/s 8 x 10MHz (multiple antennas, 8B10B) Gb/s 10 x 20 MHz (multiple antennas, 64B66B) 500 MHz, 8 antennas (sectors/mimo/comp) 500 MHz, 16x8 massive MIMO 141 Gb/s 2.25 Tb/s

6 Use of Ethernet in the fronthaul Use of commodity equipment, or at least lower-cost, industry-standard equipment Sharing of equipment with fixed access networks, enabling greater convergence and cost reductions Ethernet OAM functions standardised Use of switches/routers to enable statistical multiplexing gains and lower the aggregate bit-rate requirements of some links Use of standard IP/Ethernet network switching/routing functionality, including moves to functional virtualisation and overall network orchestration Monitoring through compatible hardware probes.

7 BBU pool to RRH connection through switches Low-latency switching required: Cut-through operation No contention/queuing

8 What sort of Ethernet links? Ethernet over CPRI? Only real advantage is provision of OAM CPRI over Ethernet? Possible Loss of synchronism through Ethernet switches Additional framing overhead New standardization efforts: IEEE (Radio-over-Ethernet) 802.1CM (Time-Sensitive Networking for Fronthaul) Sample waveform placed directly in Ethernet frames New standards required Loss of synchronism Bit-rate/bandwidth requirements

9 Round-robin transmission with VLANs SynchE required Dedicated VLANs Carrier aggregation Max Antenna ports per 100G link, A MHz MHz MHz MHz MHz

10 Weaknesses of Ethernet in the fronthaul No inherent support for synchronisation Solutions widely adopted: Synchronous Ethernet (Frequency) IEEE (Phase / Time) May require new profiles / design rules to meet fronthaul requirements Latency (and Latency Variation) Cut-through forwarding? Pre-emption? Does not solve the excessive bit-rate problem

11 New functional split New functional split lies between PHY and MAC (orange line) supports: SISO (see figure) transport of hard bits in the downlink and hard and soft bits on the uplink Massive MIMO by shifting the beamformer into the RRH CoMP by including information exchange between adjancent cells over a new X2 interface

12 Implications of new functional split Bit rate reduction and improved network utilisation from statistical multiplexing (bit rates 10x times lower than sampled I/Q) Structural convergence, topology and traffic management become more straightforward Radio (modulation) waveform agnostic BER: frame loss has different effect than with sampled waveforms (HARQ with user, not whole radio frame) Latency and Synchronisation requirements will be different and need consideration Modification /extension of some -> to Backhaul interfaces (e.g. some X2 signalling) -> to Remote for some functions Additional control interfaces may be required currently embedded within BBU OAM and SON functionality

13 Operation under a new functional split Some concepts: Control process transports control primitives, data process encapsulates LTE MAC TBs Control information (resource allocation, MCS) need highest protection SDN-type control for mapper selection Mappers for CPRI-over-Ethernet, generic I/Q-over-Ethernet, baseband (MAC)-over-Ethernet.. SON predictive algorithms, variable ETH frame sizes, link utilisation, smart probing

14 X-haul Main CO FTTx FTTc FTTh FTTb MDUs ONU ONU WDM X-haul WDM S OLT DU DU DU DU ONU DU RoE mapper Backhaul S Network Controller / Evolved Packet Core DU BBU Hotel S ETH Switch DU S Co-existence with fixed access, PONs (e.g. G.989.x)/ FTTx, CWDM, TDM Wireless fronthauling/backhauling Shared infrastructure (OPEX, CAPEX) Need for advanced network load provisioning and traffic management Resource pooling and virtualised functions But Even pressuming IP traffic (esp. Streaming-type) statistics different from mobile access.

15 Summary New functional split for fronthaul entities in C-RAN proposed Alleviates bit-rate requirements Allows stat mux gains, network load management etc.. Dyanmic RoE mapper selection with SDN-type control and SON predictive algorithms. Important requirements for latency and synchronisation/jitter remain, if requirements for correct radio frame transmission are to be met Synchronous Ethernet, PtP etc., and monitoring of links for QoS required (OAM and SON functions will be important) Ethernet equipment can allow for converged traffic through the x-haul Traffic management and load provisioning are important Reduced costs for operators This project has received funding from the European Union s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No (icirs)

16 Bit rates Table 2.1. Data rates for LTE system bandwidths per physical antenna port. Channel BW/MHz IFFT size Samples per slot 3 Sample rate 1 /MHz Data rate bit (8- bit)/mbps (30.72) (61.44) (122.88) (245.76) (491.52) 1 Sample rate= IFFT_size/T s 2 Data rate= sample_rate x 2 x 16 bps, (factor of 2 for I and Q and 16-bits per sample) 3 Samples per slot = Sample_rate/slot_duration Table 2.2. Data rates for LTE-A and 5G (est.) system bandwidths per physical antenna port for different sample widths. Channel BW/MHz Sample rate /MHz Data rate /Gbps 20 bps 16 bps 8 bps G Expected for 5G and assuming a bandwidth of 1 GHz and sampling at the Nyquist rate theoretical limit. The bandwidth may come from new spectrum allocations in the form of carrier aggregation or at mm-wave frequencies.

17 Bit rates Table 2.3. Data rates for LTE-A and 5G (est.) system bandwidths per sector for different no. of MIMO antennas (including massive MIMO implementations). Channel BW/MHz Sample rate /MHz Data rate (16 bps) /Gbps No. of antennas per sector at G

18 Bit rates Table 2.4. Extrapolated data rate requirements for CPRI for LTE-A and 5G (est.) system bandwidths per sector for different no. of MIMO antennas. Green fonts indicate data rates that are currently supported by CPRI specs while red fonts indicate data rates that will need to be supported in the future. Channel BW/MHz Sample rate /MHz CPRI data rates (15 bps) /Gbps 1 No. of antennas per sector at