Centralized small-cell radio access network with shared millimeter-wave radio-over-fiber resources

Centralized radio access networks (RANs) based on radio-over-fiber (RoF) techniques can simplify the remote access units (RAUs) and maximize the resource sharing among services and operators, thus improving the system efficiency and reducing the operational cost. A scheme of resource sharing is proposed for centralized RANs based on millimeter-wave (MMW) RoF system. Both RoF infrastructure resources and microwave-photonics resources are shared by multiple operators in the heterogeneous system. High-throughput services carried on both V-band (60 GHz) and W-band (100 GHz) are delivered to RAUs through flexible configuration at the central office (CO). This proposed multi-service centralized RAN with shared infrastructure is successfully demonstrated via both simulations and experiments.