In this article, we propose new network architectures that integrate multi-functional reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (MF-RISs) into 6G networks to enhance both communication and sensing capabilities. Firstly, we elaborate how to leverage MF-RISs for improving communication performance in different communication modes including unicast, mulitcast, and broadcast and for different multi-access schemes. Next, we emphasize synergistic benefits of integrating MF-RISs with wireless sensing, enabling more accurate and efficient target detection in 6G networks. Furthermore, we present two schemes that utilize MF-RISs to enhance the performance of integrated sensing and communication (ISAC). We also study multi-objective optimization to achieve the optimal trade-off between communication and sensing performance. Finally, we present numerical results to show the performance improvements offered by MF-RISs compared to conventional RISs in ISAC. We also outline key research directions for MF-RIS under the ambition of 6G.
@article{arxiv.2410.06584,
title = {Two Birds With One Stone: Enhancing Communication and Sensing via Multi-Functional RIS},
author = {Wanli Ni and Wen Wang and Ailing Zheng and Peng Wang and Changsheng You and Yonina C. Eldar and Dusit Niyato and Robert Schober},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2410.06584},
year = {2025}
}