Beam Tracking for Full-Duplex User Terminals in Low Earth Orbit Satellite Communication Systems

This paper introduces a novel beam tracking scheme for full-duplex ground user terminals aiming to transmit uplink and receive downlink from two low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites at the same time and same frequency. Our proposed technique leverages observed phenomena from a recent measurement campaign to strategically select transmit and receive beams which couple low self-interference across the satellites' trajectories, thereby enabling in-band full-duplex operation. Our scheme takes a measurement-driven approach, meaning it does not rely on explicit knowledge of the self-interference channel and can inherently account for hardware impairments or other nonidealities. We show that our proposed scheme reliably selects beams which spatially cancel self-interference to below the noise floor, circumventing the need for digital/analog cancellation. Simulation results using satellite and orbital parameters published in 3GPP and FCC filings show that this substantial reduction in self-interference does not prohibitively compromise beamforming gain, allowing the user terminal to attain near-maximal SINRs, thus unlocking full-duplex operation.

Analog Beamforming Codebooks for Wideband Full-Duplex Millimeter-Wave Systems

In full-duplex millimeter-wave (mmWave) systems, the effects of beam squint and the frequency-selectivity of self-interference exacerbate over wide bandwidths. This complicates the use of beamforming to cancel self-interference when communicating over bandwidths on the order of gigahertz. In this work, we present the first analog beamforming codebooks tailored to wideband full-duplex mmWave systems, designed to both combat beam squint and cancel frequency-selective self-interference. Our proposed design constructs such codebooks by minimizing self-interference across the entire band of interest while constraining the coverage provided by these codebooks across that same band. Simulation results using computational electromagnetics to model self-interference suggest that a full-duplex 60 GHz system with our design enjoys lower self-interference and delivers better coverage across bandwidths as wide as 6 GHz, when compared to similar codebook designs that ignore beam squint and/or frequency-selectivity. This allows our design to sustain higher SINRs and spectral efficiencies across wide bandwidths, unlocking the potentials of wideband full-duplex mmWave systems.

A Survey on Advancements in THz Technology for 6G: Systems, Circuits, Antennas, and Experiments

Terahertz (THz) carrier frequencies (100 GHz to 10 THz) have been touted as a source for unprecedented wireless connectivity and high-precision sensing, courtesy of their wide bandwidth availability and small wavelengths, but noteworthy implementation challenges remain to make this a reality. In this paper, we survey recent advancements in THz technology and its role in future 6G wireless networks, with a particular emphasis on the 200-400 GHz frequency range and the IEEE 802.15.3d standard. We provide a comprehensive overview of THz systems, circuits, device technology, and antennas, while also highlighting recent experimental demonstrations of THz technology. Throughout the paper, we review the state-of-the-art and call attention to open problems, future prospects, and areas of further improvement to fully realize the potential of THz communication in next-generation wireless connectivity.

Nonlinear Self-Interference Cancellation With Learnable Orthonormal Polynomials for Full-Duplex Wireless Systems

Nonlinear self-interference cancellation (SIC) is essential for full-duplex communication systems, which can offer twice the spectral efficiency of traditional half-duplex systems. The challenge of nonlinear SIC is similar to the classic problem of system identification in adaptive filter theory, whose crux lies in identifying the optimal nonlinear basis functions for a nonlinear system. This becomes especially difficult when the system input has a non-stationary distribution. In this paper, we propose a novel algorithm for nonlinear digital SIC that adaptively constructs orthonormal polynomial basis functions according to the non-stationary moments of the transmit signal. By combining these basis functions with the least mean squares (LMS) algorithm, we introduce a new SIC technique, called as the adaptive orthonormal polynomial LMS (AOP-LMS) algorithm. To reduce computational complexity for practical systems, we augment our approach with a precomputed look-up table, which maps a given modulation and coding scheme to its corresponding basis functions. Numerical simulation indicates that our proposed method surpasses existing state-of-the-art SIC algorithms in terms of convergence speed and mean squared error when the transmit signal is non-stationary, such as with adaptive modulation and coding. Experimental evaluation with a wireless testbed confirms that our proposed approach outperforms existing digital SIC algorithms.

Analog Beamforming for In-Band Full-Duplex Phased Arrays with Quantized Phase Shifters under a Per-Antenna Received Power Constraint

This letter develops a novel transmit beamforming (BF) design for canceling self-interference (SI) in analog in-band full-duplex phased arrays. Our design maximizes transmit BF gain in a desired direction while simultaneously reducing SI power to below a specified threshold on per-antenna basis to avoid saturating receive-chain components, such as LNAs. Core to our approach is that it accounts for real-world phase shifters used in analog phased array systems, whose limited resolution imposes non-convex constraints on BF design. We overcome this by transforming these non-convex constraints into convex polygon constraints, which we then solve through semidefinite relaxation and a rank refinement procedure. Numerical results show that our proposed BF scheme reliably cancels SI to the target power threshold at each receive antenna while sacrificing little in transmit BF gain, even with modest phase shifter resolution.

Feasibility Analysis of In-Band Coexistence in Dense LEO Satellite Communication Systems

This work provides a rigorous methodology for assessing the feasibility of spectrum sharing between large low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellations. For concreteness, we focus on the existing Starlink system and the soon-to-be-launched Kuiper system, which is prohibited from inflicting excessive interference onto the incumbent Starlink ground users. We carefully model and study the potential downlink interference between the two systems and investigate how strategic satellite selection may be used by Kuiper to serve its ground users while also protecting Starlink ground users. We then extend this notion of satellite selection to the case where Kuiper has limited knowledge of Starlink's serving satellite. Our findings reveal that there is always the potential for very high and extremely low interference, depending on which Starlink and Kuiper satellites are being used to serve their users. Consequently, we show that Kuiper can protect Starlink ground users with high probability, by strategically selecting which of its satellites are used to serve its ground users. Simultaneously, Kuiper is capable of delivering near-maximal downlink SINR to its own ground users. This highlights a feasible route to the coexistence of two dense LEO satellite systems, even in scenarios where one system has limited knowledge of the other's serving satellites.

Real-World Evaluation of Full-Duplex Millimeter Wave Communication Systems

Noteworthy strides continue to be made in the development of full-duplex millimeter wave (mmWave) communication systems, but most of this progress has been built on theoretical models and validated through simulation. In this work, we conduct a long overdue real-world evaluation of full-duplex mmWave systems using off-the-shelf 60 GHz phased arrays. Using an experimental full-duplex base station, we collect over 200,000 measurements of self-interference by electronically sweeping its transmit and receive beams across a dense spatial profile, shedding light on the effects of the environment, array positioning, and beam steering direction. We then call attention to five key challenges faced by practical full-duplex mmWave systems and, with these in mind, propose a general framework for beamforming-based full-duplex solutions. Guided by this framework, we introduce a novel solution called STEER+, a more robust version of recent work called STEER, and experimentally evaluate both in a real-world setting with actual downlink and uplink users. Rather than purely minimize self-interference as with STEER, STEER+ makes use of additional measurements to maximize spectral efficiency, which proves to make it much less sensitive to one's choice of design parameters. We experimentally show that STEER+ can reliably reduce self-interference to near or below the noise floor while maintaining high SNR on the downlink and uplink, thus enabling full-duplex operation purely via beamforming.

Full-Duplex Transceivers for Next-Generation Wireless Communication Systems

Wireless communication systems can be enhanced at the link level, in medium access, and at the network level when transceivers are equipped with full-duplex capability: the transformative ability to simultaneously transmit and receive over the same frequency spectrum. Effective methods to cancel self-interference are required to facilitate full-duplex operation, which we overview herein in the context of traditional radios, along with those in next-generation wireless networks. We highlight advances in self-interference cancellation that leverage machine learning, and we summarize key considerations and recent progress in full-duplex millimeter-wave systems and their application in integrated access and backhaul. We present example design problems and noteworthy findings from recent experimental research to introduce and motivate the advancement of full-duplex millimeter-wave systems. We conclude this chapter by forecasting the future of full-duplex and outlining important research directions that warrant further study.

Spatial and Statistical Modeling of Multi-Panel Millimeter Wave Self-Interference

Characterizing self-interference is essential to the design and evaluation of in-band full-duplex communication systems. Until now, little has been understood about this coupling in full-duplex systems operating at millimeter wave (mmWave) frequencies, and it has been shown that highly-idealized models proposed for such do not align with practice. This work presents the first spatial and statistical model of multi-panel mmWave self-interference backed by measurements, enabling engineers to draw realizations that exhibit the large-scale and small-scale spatial characteristics observed in our nearly 6.5 million measurements. Core to our model is its use of system and model parameters having real-world meaning, which facilitates the extension of our model to systems beyond our own phased array platform through proper parameterization. We demonstrate this by collecting nearly 13 million additional measurements to show that our model can generalize to two other system configurations. We assess our model by comparing it against actual measurements to confirm its ability to align spatially and in distribution with real-world self-interference. In addition, using both measurements and our model of self-interference, we evaluate an existing beamforming-based full-duplex mmWave solution to illustrate that our model can be reliably used to design new solutions and validate the performance improvements they may offer.

STEER: Beam Selection for Full-Duplex Millimeter Wave Communication Systems

Modern millimeter wave (mmWave) communication systems rely on beam alignment to deliver sufficient beamforming gain to close the link between devices. We present a novel beam selection methodology for multi-panel, full-duplex mmWave systems, which we call STEER, that delivers high beamforming gain while significantly reducing the full-duplex self-interference coupled between the transmit and receive beams. STEER does not necessitate changes to conventional beam alignment methodologies nor additional over-the-air feedback, making it compatible with existing cellular standards. Instead, STEER uses conventional beam alignment to identify the general directions beams should be steered, and then it makes use of a minimal number of self-interference measurements to jointly select transmit and receive beams that deliver high gain in these directions while coupling low self-interference. We implement STEER on an industry-grade 28 GHz phased array platform and use further simulation to show that full-duplex operation with beams selected by STEER can notably outperform both half-duplex and full-duplex operation with beams chosen via conventional beam selection. For instance, STEER can reliably reduce self-interference by more than 20 dB and improve SINR by more than 10 dB, compared to conventional beam selection. Our experimental results highlight that beam alignment can be used not only to deliver high beamforming gain in full-duplex mmWave systems but also to mitigate self-interference to levels near or below the noise floor, rendering additional self-interference cancellation unnecessary with STEER.