Signal Processing and Communications Group

6G communication and SENsing for determiniStic wirEless networkS (6-SENSES)

Acronym:    6-SENSES
Code:    PID2022-138648OB-I00
Funder:    Spanish Government - MINISTERIO DE CIENCIA, INNOVACIÓN Y UNIVERSIDADES (MICIU) - AGENCIA ESTATAL DE INVESTIGACIÓN (AEI)  and  ERDF (European Union)
Start date:    2023 September 1st
End date:    2026 August 31st
Keywords: 6G, communication and sensing, deterministic wireless networks, time sensitive networks, massive MIMO, AI/ML/RL, intelligent reflective surfaces, smart factory, intelligent transport networks, smart health

Participants: Margarita Cabrera Beán, Olga Muñoz Medina, Montserrat Nájar Martón, Antonio Pascual Iserte, Josep Vidal Manzano, Pau Closas Gómez, Cristian García Ruiz, Carla Macías López, Ainna Yue Moreno Locubiche

SPCOM Principal Investigator:  Olga Muñoz Medina (IP1), Antonio Pascual Iserte (IP2)

This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the project

6-SENSES (grant PID2022-138648OB-I00) funded by MICIU / AEI / 10.13039/501100011033 and ERDF, EU

 

Summary

Envisioned scenarios for the future society include smart industries where humans and machines collaborate, intelligent transport with interconnected vehicles, human-centric health applications, haptic X-reality, and multi-sense networks among others. From a technical point of view, these scenarios and vertical applications will only be possible through deterministic communication networks, a concept that encompasses enhanced ultra-high reliability, availability, time-sensitiveness, and accurate performance predictability beyond what 5G systems can offer.

6G has to become a high capacity trustworthy communication media that provides guarantees on the packet delivery with tight constraints operating with thousands of devices, interference, mixed traffic types, and harsh propagation and mobility conditions. Those are major challenges for the existing Internet infrastructure. Therefore, disruptive solutions are needed to really implement networks with deterministic behaviour, where the impact of the random nature of wireless networks is reduced to a minimum and the quality of the requested services is consistently guaranteed to predefined levels over a period of time. Solutions should allow users enjoying new and higher quality services, and operators generating fresh sources of revenue with affordable investments.

Aligned with these trends, the overall technical goal of the project 6-SENSES is to design, analyse, and evaluate technologies that meet the requirements for ubiquitous connectivity, high reliability, ultra-low latency, and real-time sharing of an enormous amount of information rich and safety-critical data. Our hypothesis is that we can accomplish this goal by enabling artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled deterministic 6G wireless communication networks.

6-SENSES addresses the challenges related to key drivers in the physical, access and data link layers of the wireless segment:
homogeneous coverage, robust signalling, service-guarantee resource allocation, traffic randomness reduction, interference management, sensing and computation in mobility scenarios with the overall purpose of generating recommendations for new 6G networks. Specifically, the research plan includes:

1) The introduction of transmission technologies in cmWave/mmWave bands relying on distributed massive MIMO systems and intelligent reflecting surfaces (incorporating both active and passive antenna elements) able to shape the radio environment in a smart way and provide homogeneous and predictable coverage.

2) The development of integrated sensing and communication technologies that take advantage of the larger bandwidth, multiconnectivity and antenna aperture for offering more robust and accurate localization and sensing capabilities with high availability anytime and anywhere.

3) The design of new architectural concepts and protocols based on the integration of different communication/edge computation storage elements, where multiple concurrent services with various requirements and applications may coexist and that are highly resilient to network anomalies, mobility, and uncertainties.

4) The adoption of methodologies for the overall analysis, design, and optimization of networks based on stochastic geometry, queueing theory, multi-objective optimization methods, Lyapunov optimization, extreme value theory, and AI tools (such as RL) to enable the network to learn and evolve in autonomous way.

Workplan

  • WP1: Management and coordination of tasks
  • WP2: Scenarios, requirements, and KPIs
  • WP3: Access links and intelligent radio environment designs
  • WP4: Integrated sensing and communication
  • WP5. Mobility management and multi-access edge computing
  • WP6: Application scenarios and evaluation
  • WP7: Dissemination

 

Publications

Project publications at UPC repository: https://futur.upc.edu/37257117

(some publications may have not been uploaded yet to the UPC repository. See below the project's complete list to date)

Complete list of project publications:

JOURNALS

[JCar24] Carrasco-Ribelles, Lucía A., Margarita Cabrera-Bean, Jose Llanes-Jurado, and Concepción Violán. "Use of Attention Maps to Enrich Discriminability in Deep Learning Prediction Models Using Longitudinal Data from Electronic Health Records," Applied Sciences, volumen 15, no. 1: 146, December 2024, DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/app15010146

[JCar25] Carrasco-Ribelles, L.A., Cabrera-Bean, M., Khalid, S. et al. “Development of Attention-based Prediction Models for All-cause Mortality, Home Care Need, and Nursing Home Admission in Ageing Adults in Spain Using Longitudinal Electronic Health Record Data,” Journal of Medical Systems, volumen 49 , January 2025, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-024-02138-z

[JLie25a] Sergi Liesegang, Antonio Pascual-Iserte, and Olga Muñoz. “Robust design of reconfigurable intelligent surfaces for parameter estimation in MTC,” EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking,  March 2025, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13638-025-02445-0

CONFERENCES

[CMut24] Karthik Muthineni, Alexander Artemenko, Josep Vidal, and Montse Nájar, "Outlier Rejection for 5G-Based Indoor Positioning in Ray-Tracing-Enabled Industrial Scenario", ICC 2024 - IEEE International Conference on Communications, Denver (USA), June 2024, DOI: 10.1109/ICC51166.2024.10622520.

[CMac24a] Carla Macías, Arnau Saumell, Montse Nájar and Pau Closas, "RIS Phase Optimization for Near-Field 5G Positioning: ML-Enhanced CRLB Minimization", 2024 32nd European Signal Processing Conference (EUSIPCO), Lyon (France), August 2024, DOI: 10.23919/EUSIPCO63174.2024.10715164. 

[CMac24b] Carla Macías, Montse Nájar and Pau Closas, "RIS phase optimization for Near-Field 5G Positioning: CRLB Minimization", 2024 IEEE 35th International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications (PIMRC), Valencia (Spain), September 2024, DOI: 10.1109/PIMRC59610.2024.10817432.

[CKai24] Youseff El Kaisi, Javier Villares, and Olga Muñoz, "Novel Radio Frame Design for Efficient Integration of Wireless Links into Time-Sensitive Networks," 2024 IEEE 35th International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications (PIMRC), Valencia, Spain, September 2024, pp. 1-6, DOI: 10.1109/PIMRC59610.2024.10817459. 

[CCam24] David Campoy García, Olga Muñoz, Antonio Pascual-Iserte, “Impact of Near-Field Conditions on the Performance of RIS-aided mmWave Communication Strategies”. Proceedings VTC Fall 2024 (IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference Fall), pp. 1-6, ISBN 979-8-3315-1778-6. Washington (USA), October 2024. DOI: 10.1109/VTC2024-Fall63153.2024.10757771. 

[COcho24] Ochonu and J. Vidal, "Slice-aware Resource Allocation and Admission Control for Smart Factory Wireless Networks," 2024 IEEE 100th Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC2024-Fall), Washington, DC, USA, October 2024, pp. 1-7, DOI: 10.1109/VTC2024-Fall63153.2024.10757564. 

[CCab24] M. Cabrera-Bean, W. Pan and J. Vidal, "Reinforcement Learning-based UL/DL Splitter for Latency Reduction in Wireless TSN Networks," 2024 IEEE 100th Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC2024-Fall), Washington, DC, USA, October 2024, pp. 1-7, DOI: 10.1109/VTC2024-Fall63153.2024.10757943. 

[CPas24] Adrián Pastor, Antonio Pascual-Iserte, Olga Muñoz, “RIS-aided Location Estimation Based on MVDR in Near-Field Conditions”. Proceedings VTC Fall 2024 (IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference Fall), pp. 1-7, ISBN 979-8-3315-1778-6. Washington (USA), October 2024. DOI: 10.1109/VTC2024-Fall63153.2024.10757630. 

Newsletters

 

Deliverable

  • Deliverable DP: Description of the activities to be done according to the tasks of the project, interactions, planning, and meetings.

 

Open-access code

More information:

Send an email to: olga.munozupc.edu