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Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SILIKA (Silicon-based Ka-band massive MIMO antenna systems for new telecommunication services)

Teaser

Summary

The continuously growing need in wireless communications for higher data rates necessitates more wireless spectrum to be made available for new applications. For the next generation of mobile communication, called 5G, licenses in the millimeter-wave (mm-wave) spectrum, i.e. starting around 30 GHz, are going to be issued on top of the current sub-6 GHz bands to meet this demand. Since higher frequencies experience a larger free space attenuation, large-scale multi-antenna massive MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) base-stations with hundreds or thousands of active antenna elements are needed.

To offer mm-wave 5G technology at affordable prices to the end-user, these base-stations have to make use of reliable, low-cost antenna architectures and technologies. The fact that RF power generation is distributed over a large number of active antenna elements allows the use of highly-integrated and cost-effective (Bi-)CMOS technologies. In combination with novel massive MIMO signal processing techniques, this approach can achieve a high performance system at low costs. However, Europe requires specialists in this area that are trained to develop such multi-disciplinary systems. These experts can take leading roles within the EU ecosystem and maintain European leadership in the domain of wireless communications. Due to the novelty of these base-stations, these specialists have to be trained first. Therefore, SILIKA aims at educating 12 early-stage researchers (ESRs) to develop low-power, low-cost, silicon-based massive MIMO solutions and equip them with a comprehensive set of transferable skills relevant for long-term innovation and long-term employability. Working on different aspects throughout the entire system value chain and in cooperation with leading European industry, the ESRs will build a solid, multi-disciplinary and intra-European network that will fuel innovation and excellence in the EU for the coming decades.

Work performed

During the first half of the project, the ESRs have elaborated on the state-of-the art of multi-antenna systems, nowadays mainly used in defence and radio astronomy. The introductory courses and workshops of the training programme equipped them with the necessary theoretical background as well as currently used technologies, system trade-offs and typical application implementations. Based on this foundation, the ESRs developed a system demonstrator concept. For this, they organised a series of sessions, followed by a workshop in November 2017, where the concept was finalised. The concept is based on two different antenna architectures, one for the near-range of the base-station and one for the far-range. The near-range is covered by an irregular sparse array (ISA) in order to allow complex beam-shaping while the far-range is covered by a focal-plane-array (FPA) in order to achieve high signal strength without the need for a large transmit power. Moreover, the ESRs developed a core module, consisting of an active 2x2 sub-array based on a NXP analog beamforming chip. This module is a suitable building block for both, the ISA and FPA architecture. Moreover, it is designed to directly interface with the mm-wave communications test-bench â€œMATEâ€ at Chalmers University. MATE allows the implementation of real-time signal processing algorithms, such that all aspects covered by the project can be tested in a single system demonstrator. Following the approval of the concept by the consortium, the ESRs continued their training by starting the development of the core module. The first iteration of the prototype was recently fabricated and is currently being tested.

Final results

Thanks to the good collaboration of the ESRs, their radically new base-station concept and the active involvement of the industrial hosts, the ESRs were able to achieve several results that are beyond state-of-the-art. These results were published at internationally renowned journals and conferences. At the end of the reporting period, 4 journal articles were submitted, 9 conference articles accepted and 3 conference articles submitted. We believe that by the end of project the team with then well trained experts will be able to successfully present their innovative base-station concept. The gained insights will support a successful roll-out of mm-wave 5G technology and, for example, aid consortium member Ericsson with the decision making in their own mm-wave base-station development and consortium member NXP with the improvement of their beamforming chips for base-station applications. Both members have also already indicated their strong interest to hire ESRs at the end of the project, expanding the intra-European network that will fuel further innovation.