TY - JOUR
T1 - Towards Deterministic Communications in 6G Networks: State of the Art, Open Challenges and the Way Forward
AU - Sharma, Gourav Prateek
AU - Patel, Dhruvin
AU - Sachs, Joachim
AU - Andrade, Marilet De
AU - Farkas, Janos
AU - Harmatos, Janos
AU - Varga, Balazs
AU - Bernhard, Hans-Peter
AU - Muzaffar, Raheeb
AU - Atiq, Mahin K.
AU - Duerr, Frank
AU - Bruckner, Dietmar
AU - Montesdeoca, Edgardo
AU - Houatra, Drissa
AU - Zhang, Hongwei
AU - Gross, James
PY - 2023/10/1
Y1 - 2023/10/1
N2 - Over the last decade, society and industries are undergoing rapid digitization that is expected to lead to the evolution of the cyber-physical continuum. End-to-end deterministic communications infrastructure is the essential glue that will bridge the digital and physical worlds of the continuum. We describe the state of the art and open challenges with respect to contemporary deterministic communications and compute technologies— 3GPP 5G, IEEE Time-Sensitive Networking, IETF DetNet, OPC UA as well as edge computing. While these technologies represent significant technological advancements towards networking Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS), we argue in this paper that they rather represent a first generation of systems which are still limited in different dimensions. In contrast, realizing future deterministic communications systems requires, firstly, seamless convergence between these technologies and, secondly, scalability to support heterogeneous (time-varying requirements) arising from diverse CPS applications. In addition, future deterministic communication networks will have to provide such characteristics end-to-end, which for CPS refers to the entire communication and computation loop, from sensors to actuators. In this paper, we discuss the state of the art regarding the main challenges towards these goals: predictability, end-to-end technology integration, end-to-end security, and scalable vertical application interfacing. We then present our vision regarding viable approaches and technological enablers to overcome these four central challenges. In particular, we argue that there is currently a window of opportunity to establish, through 6G standardization, the foundations towards a scalable and converged deterministic communications and compute infrastructure. Key approaches to leverage in that regard are 6G system evolutions, wireless friendly integration of 6G into TSN and DetNet, novel end-to-end security approaches, efficient edge-cloud integrations, data-driven approaches for stochastic characterization and prediction, as well as leveraging digital twins towards system awareness.
AB - Over the last decade, society and industries are undergoing rapid digitization that is expected to lead to the evolution of the cyber-physical continuum. End-to-end deterministic communications infrastructure is the essential glue that will bridge the digital and physical worlds of the continuum. We describe the state of the art and open challenges with respect to contemporary deterministic communications and compute technologies— 3GPP 5G, IEEE Time-Sensitive Networking, IETF DetNet, OPC UA as well as edge computing. While these technologies represent significant technological advancements towards networking Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS), we argue in this paper that they rather represent a first generation of systems which are still limited in different dimensions. In contrast, realizing future deterministic communications systems requires, firstly, seamless convergence between these technologies and, secondly, scalability to support heterogeneous (time-varying requirements) arising from diverse CPS applications. In addition, future deterministic communication networks will have to provide such characteristics end-to-end, which for CPS refers to the entire communication and computation loop, from sensors to actuators. In this paper, we discuss the state of the art regarding the main challenges towards these goals: predictability, end-to-end technology integration, end-to-end security, and scalable vertical application interfacing. We then present our vision regarding viable approaches and technological enablers to overcome these four central challenges. In particular, we argue that there is currently a window of opportunity to establish, through 6G standardization, the foundations towards a scalable and converged deterministic communications and compute infrastructure. Key approaches to leverage in that regard are 6G system evolutions, wireless friendly integration of 6G into TSN and DetNet, novel end-to-end security approaches, efficient edge-cloud integrations, data-driven approaches for stochastic characterization and prediction, as well as leveraging digital twins towards system awareness.
KW - 6G mobile communication
KW - Standards
KW - Reliability
KW - Convergence
KW - Automation
KW - Ultra reliable low latency communication
KW - Security
KW - Wireless networks
KW - Machine learning
UR - https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10254227/
U2 - 10.1109/ACCESS.2023.3316605
DO - 10.1109/ACCESS.2023.3316605
M3 - Article
SN - 2169-3536
VL - PP
SP - 1
EP - 1
JO - IEEE Access
JF - IEEE Access
IS - 99
M1 - 10254227
ER -