Zhengchuan Chen;Tianqing Yang;Shuyang Fang;Li Zhen;Nikolaos Pappas;Min Wang;Dapeng O. Wu;Tony Q. S. Quek
{"title":"Age Analysis of Critical Information in Internet of Vehicle Networks With Service Confluence","authors":"Zhengchuan Chen;Tianqing Yang;Shuyang Fang;Li Zhen;Nikolaos Pappas;Min Wang;Dapeng O. Wu;Tony Q. S. Quek","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556411","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556411","url":null,"abstract":"The timeliness of critical information (CI) for controlling connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) in Internet of vehicles is investigated, using the age of information (AoI) metric. A service confluence strategy is presented, where two roadside units extract CI packet for a CAV and the CAV adopts the AoI-minimum CI packet for control. We derive the average Age of Information (AoI) for initially synchronized CI packet arrivals, where the CI packets from both RSUs are transmitted at coordinated intervals, ensuring aligned arrival times. We then extend the analysis to asynchronous cases, where the CI packets from the two RSUs may arrive at the CAV at arbitrary, non-coordinated times due to differences in processing delays or timing discrepancies between the servers. Additionally, we consider cases where the service times are irrational numbers, which introduces further complexity in the AoI calculations.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"2556-2565"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10945805","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143830539","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A TSN-Like Slot-Based Scheduler for Improved Wireless Quality and Platoon Formation in Smart Factories","authors":"Angelo Feraudo;Andrea Garbugli;Paolo Bellavista","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556513","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556513","url":null,"abstract":"The platooning of mobile robots, facilitated by Device-to-Device (D2D) communications, has become central in Industry 4.0, enhancing material transport, reducing energy consumption, and improving safety in smart factories. However, as the number of participating robots increases, maintaining effective communication and coordination becomes increasingly challenging. Shared spectrum usage in D2D networks can lead to communication collisions, particularly in highly dynamic scenarios, posing significant challenges in industrial environments. This paper introduces a novel slot-based solution inspired by Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) to address these challenges, ensuring reliable, low-latency communication while optimizing resource allocation and communication efficiency in platooning systems. To achieve this, we propose a controller named TSNCtl, operating at the application layer of the network stack. TSNCtl leverages a finite state machine (FSM) to manage platoon formation and employs slot-based scheduling for efficient message dissemination. Using the simulation framework and INET library, we demonstrate the effectiveness of TSNCtl in reducing packet collisions across a variety of scenarios. Our experimental results highlight a significant improvement over the traditional CSMA/CA baseline employed in -based protocols such as IEEE 802.11p. For instance, TSNCtl achieves near-zero packet collisions with appropriate configurations, even in highly dynamic environments.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"1-1"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10947023","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143850884","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Ahmed M. Benaya;Mohamed I. AlHajri;Mahmoud H. Ismail;Mohamed S. Hassan;Taha Landolsi
{"title":"Outage Analysis of THz-Enabled IRS-Assisted Multi-User Space–Air—Ground Integrated Networks","authors":"Ahmed M. Benaya;Mohamed I. AlHajri;Mahmoud H. Ismail;Mohamed S. Hassan;Taha Landolsi","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556887","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556887","url":null,"abstract":"Ubiquitous connectivity through the integration of terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks has become one of the crucial usage scenarios in the sixth generation (6G) vision. In this paper, we analyze the outage performance of a multi-user aerial intelligent reflecting surface (IRS)-assisted space-air-ground integrated network (SAGIN) operating in the terahertz (THz) band. The system consists of a low earth orbit (LEO) satellite that communicates with a group of user equipment (UEs) through a terrestrial base station (TBS) relay. Due to the presence of obstacles and shadowing, a high-altitude platform station (HAPS)-mounted IRS is utilized to assist the communication scenario. We derive exact closed-form expressions for the outage probabilities at the UEs through the TBS relay and through the HAPS using the multivariate Fox’s H-function assuming optimal IRS phase shifts. Moreover, we derive approximate closed-form expressions using the central limit theory (CLT) for a sufficiently large number of IRS elements for both optimal phase shifts and phase shift estimation errors cases. Monte Carlo simulations are conducted to validate the derived expressions. Simulation results demonstrate that deploying HAPS-mounted IRS significantly enhances the outage performance at lower satellite transmit power and provides coverage over larger service areas.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"2599-2615"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10946990","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143848838","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Alejandro Lancho;Amir Weiss;Gary C. F. Lee;Tejas Jayashankar;Binoy G. Kurien;Yury Polyanskiy;Gregory W. Wornell
{"title":"RF Challenge: The Data-Driven Radio Frequency Signal Separation Challenge","authors":"Alejandro Lancho;Amir Weiss;Gary C. F. Lee;Tejas Jayashankar;Binoy G. Kurien;Yury Polyanskiy;Gregory W. Wornell","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556319","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556319","url":null,"abstract":"We address the critical problem of interference rejection in radio-frequency (RF) signals using a data-driven approach that leverages deep-learning methods. A primary contribution of this paper is the introduction of the RF Challenge, which is a publicly available, diverse RF signal dataset for data-driven analyses of RF signal problems. Specifically, we adopt a simplified signal model for developing and analyzing interference rejection algorithms. For this signal model, we introduce a set of carefully chosen deep learning architectures, incorporating key domain-informed modifications alongside traditional benchmark solutions to establish baseline performance metrics for this intricate, ubiquitous problem. Through extensive simulations involving eight different signal mixture types, we demonstrate the superior performance (in some cases, by two orders of magnitude) of architectures such as UNet and WaveNet over traditional methods like matched filtering and linear minimum mean square error estimation. Our findings suggest that the data-driven approach can yield scalable solutions, in the sense that the same architectures may be similarly trained and deployed for different types of signals. Moreover, these findings further corroborate the promising potential of deep learning algorithms for enhancing communication systems, particularly via interference mitigation. This work also includes results from an open competition based on the RF Challenge, hosted at the 2024 IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (ICASSP’24).","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4083-4100"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10945811","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144072944","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Timo Kellermann;Roger Pueyo Centelles;Anna Calveras
{"title":"UE Context Dissemination in Sparse LEO Constellations for 5G/6G Cellular IoT in Store and Forward Operation","authors":"Timo Kellermann;Roger Pueyo Centelles;Anna Calveras","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556318","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3556318","url":null,"abstract":"The rapid expansion of the Internet of Things (IoT) highlights the need for ubiquitous connectivity, especially in remote and underserved areas. As a cornerstone of current 5th Generation (5G) cellular IoT networks, Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) supports diverse massive Machine-Type Communications (mMTC) applications. With mMTC expected to remain integral to future 6th Generation (6G) standards, satellite-based Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTNs), particularly Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations, offer a practical solution for addressing connectivity gaps in delay-tolerant IoT scenarios. This paper investigates the architecture and operational dynamics of sparse multi-satellite LEO constellations that employ store and forward mechanisms, which become essential when continuous end-to-end connectivity is unfeasible. Effective User Equipment (UE) context dissemination among satellites is a key requirement in such constellations to maintain sufficient service levels. We present an enhanced architecture that contains the mechanisms for UE context dissemination and investigate key performance metrics, such as revisit times and end-to-end delays for data transmission. Our findings indicate that multi-satellite configurations are crucial in providing sufficient service levels to UEs, particularly in sparse constellations. Moreover, we demonstrate that, depending on the revisit time requirements, dissemination among a subset of satellites is sufficient, albeit with an increase in end-to-end delays for data transmissions.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"2539-2555"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10945806","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143830492","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"PUF-AQKD: A Hardware-Assisted Quantum Key Distribution Protocol for Man-in-the-Middle Attack Mitigation","authors":"Ashutosh Bhatia;Sainath Bitragunta;Kamlesh Tiwari","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3575206","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3575206","url":null,"abstract":"The Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) protocol utilizes quantum mechanics principles for cryptographic key exchange, ensuring absolute secrecy. Current QKD techniques are susceptible to man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks due to the absence of an inherent mechanism for identity verification within the quantum channel. For authentication, these systems rely on classical or post-quantum cryptography, which diminishes the perfect security advantage provided by QKD. We present a Physical Unclonable Function (PUF)-based authenticated QKD protocol (PUF-AQKD), which avoids the necessity for authenticated classical channels and is useful in mitigating MITM attacks. The fundamental concept of PUF-AQKD is to implement a phase shift in the basis used for polarizing the transmitted qubits. The phase shift is dictated by PUFs, which are anticipated to result in analogous (correlated) responses for devices manufactured under similar conditions but dissimilar responses in different conditions. An adversary lacking a correlated PUF response shared by Alice and Bob would inadvertently increase the Quantum Bit Error Rates (QBER) observed at Bob’s end. We present a mathematical model to assess the efficacy of the proposed PUF-AQKD method and perform simulations utilizing the NetSquid simulator. The mathematical analysis and simulation findings indicate that PUF-AQKD can efficiently identify eavesdroppers, even during incomplete measurements, without the necessity of an authorized classical channel.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4923-4942"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11018517","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144472648","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Óscar G. Martins;Henrik Åkesson;Marco Gomes;Diana P. M. Osorio;Padmanava Sen;João P. Vilela
{"title":"Delving Into Security and Privacy of Joint Communication and Sensing: A Survey","authors":"Óscar G. Martins;Henrik Åkesson;Marco Gomes;Diana P. M. Osorio;Padmanava Sen;João P. Vilela","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574859","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574859","url":null,"abstract":"Joint Communication and Sensing (JCAS) systems are emerging as a core technology for next-generation wireless systems due to the potential to achieve higher spectral efficiency, energy savings, and new services beyond communications. This paper provides a review of the state-of-the-art in JCAS systems by focusing on obtrusive passive sensing capabilities and inherent security and privacy challenges that arise from the integration of communication and sensing. From this point of view, we discuss existing techniques for mitigating security and privacy issues, as well as important aspects for the designing of secure and privacy-aware JCAS systems. Additionally, we discuss future research directions by emphasizing on new enabling technologies and their integration on JCAS systems along with their role in privacy and security aspects. We also discuss the required modifications to existing systems and the design of new systems with privacy and security awareness, where the challenging trade-offs between security, privacy and performance of the JCAS system must be considered.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4978-5004"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11017670","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144472646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Impact of Channel and System Parameters on Performance Evaluation of Frequency Extrapolation Using Machine Learning","authors":"Michael Neuman;Daoud Burghal;Andreas F. Molisch","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3575037","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3575037","url":null,"abstract":"Channel extrapolation in the frequency domain is an important tool for reducing overhead and latency in frequency division duplex (FDD) wireless communications systems. Over the past years, various machine learning (ML) techniques have been proposed for this goal, but their effectiveness is usually evaluated only for a limited number of examples. This paper presents an extensive investigation of the impact of various parameters, both of the system and of the underlying channels, on the performance of three types of ML algorithms, namely K-nearest neighbor (KNN), convolutional multilayer perceptron (CNN/MLP), and autoencoder structures (AE). We analyze the impact of channel coherence bandwidth and coherence distance, and the number of multipath components, as well as system bandwidth, number of subcarriers, duplex distance, and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in uplink and downlink. We also consider both complex and magnitude normalized mean-square error (NMSE) as training and evaluation metrics. Physical interpretations of the obtained results are given. Most importantly, we find that the NMSE can vary by 10 dB or more over physically reasonable ranges of parameters but often shows saturation behavior over part of those ranges. We also find that, in particular, KNN results can be quantitatively and qualitatively different from CNN/MLP and AE. These investigations thus provide insights into meaningful parameter choices for the performance evaluation of new ML algorithms for frequency-domain channel extrapolation.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4840-4853"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11017722","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144314799","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Rohan Tripathi;Ritam Rao;Vivekananda Bhat K.;Abhishek Kumar Pandey;Ashok Kumar Das
{"title":"Secure Blockchain Integration Approach for Knowledge Discovery in Industrial Internet of Things","authors":"Rohan Tripathi;Ritam Rao;Vivekananda Bhat K.;Abhishek Kumar Pandey;Ashok Kumar Das","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574816","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574816","url":null,"abstract":"The field of Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is now being duly recognized as a revolutionary area in industrial automation. With the budding interest of knowledge discovery that helps the businesses in applying technology on a large scale, researchers are now faced with several major security concerns. Blockchain integration is one of the suggested applications of technology that could help secure the data during transmission, storage, and knowledge discovery. Moreover, by integrating smart contracts, a secure architecture could also assimilate accountability during data exchange. Thus, we propose a four-layer security architecture that isolates IIoT devices from user-oriented layers and maintains a record of all IIoT devices registered in the organization to prevent malicious devices from corrupting the database and discovery process. Further, by choosing proof of authority (PoA), we ensure the fair functioning of the Blockchain nodes. Through proxy re-encryption for clients, PoA consensus for Blockchain nodes, and Whitelist-based access control for IIoT Devices, we ensure the legitimacy of all participating nodes. We also implement a prototype using a private Ethereum network with proof of authority consensus and present the time taken for the entire exchange and the gas (ethereum currency) consumed per exchange by the contracts. Also we implemented the secure knowledge discovery to understand the significance of the developed scheme. The results show that the exchange can be implemented in an IIoT environment and work with a reasonable amount of resource consumption.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4772-4787"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11017668","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144272705","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Oscar Adamuz-Hinojosa;Felix Delgado-Ferro;Jorge Navarro-Ortiz;Pablo Muñoz;Pablo Ameigeiras
{"title":"Unleashing 5G Seamless Integration With TSN for Industry 5.0: Frame Forwarding and QoS Treatment","authors":"Oscar Adamuz-Hinojosa;Felix Delgado-Ferro;Jorge Navarro-Ortiz;Pablo Muñoz;Pablo Ameigeiras","doi":"10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574397","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2025.3574397","url":null,"abstract":"Integrating Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) and 5th Generation (5G) systems is key for providing wireless low-latency services in industry. Despite research efforts, challenges remain. Due to the lack of commercial 5G modems supporting Ethernet-based sessions, tunneling mechanisms must be used to enable Layer 2 connectivity between TSN islands via IP-based 5G modems. Furthermore, harmonizing traffic classification and prioritization between TSN and 5G technologies is crucial for meeting industrial service requirements. In this work, we propose a Virtual Extensible LAN (VxLAN)-based solution to harmonize frame forwarding and Quality of Service (QoS) treatment among 5G and TSN. Our solution supports multiple Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs) across several production lines. Furthermore, it supports TSN traffic mapping into 5G QoS flows. We use a 5G testbed to validate the effectiveness of the adopted solution. Our results show the average delay introduced by the proposed mechanisms is approximately <inline-formula> <tex-math>$100~mu s$ </tex-math></inline-formula>, which is significantly lower than the typical 5G packet transmission delay. Moreover, our findings demonstrate our solution preserves QoS treatment between the 5G system and TSN, ensuring that the priority of 5G QoS flows aligns with the priorities of industrial traffic flows.","PeriodicalId":33803,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society","volume":"6 ","pages":"4874-4884"},"PeriodicalIF":6.3,"publicationDate":"2025-03-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11016774","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144314756","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}