The recently proposed NR-ready integrated access and backhaul (IAB) architecture promises to bring a cost-efficient deployment solution for both coverage extension and capacity boosting in future 5G/5G+ systems. While its impact on the coverage extension was thoughtfully addressed in the literature, the effect of advanced functionalities such as multi-hop, multi-connectivity, and multi-beam operations on the throughput remains unclear. We review and characterize the system-level impact of these capabilities on the performance of self-backhauled IAB systems operating in half-duplex mode and utilizing millimeter-wave (mmWave) technology across both access and backhaul. Our results indicate that the throughput gain of multi-hopping and multi-beaming is significant even without multi-connectivity operation. Another important learning is that in all-mmWave systems with link blockage, multi-connectivity with link switching allows achieving self-load balancing. Finally, we outline future research directions.
@article{arxiv.2205.09202,
title = {Integrated Access and Backhaul in Millimeter-Wave Cellular: Benefits and Challenges},
author = {Yekaterina Sadovaya and Dmitri Moltchanov and Wei Mao and Oner Orhan and Shu-ping Yeh and Hosein Nikopour and Shilpa Talwar and Sergey Andreev},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2205.09202},
year = {2022}
}
Comments
Accepted for publishing in the IEEE Communications Magazine