ASPEN: Advanced Signal Processing in Perceptive Next-Generation Networks

TITLE:          Advanced Signal Processing in Perceptive Next-Generation Networks - 2
                      Procesado Avanzado de la Señal en Redes Perceptivas de Nueva Generación - 2

Type/Area:  Proyectos de Investigación Orientada ; tipo A / Tecnologías de la Información y las Comunicaciones
Acronym:    ASPEN
Code:           PID2025-167766OA-C22
Funder:       Spanish Government - AGENCIA ESTATAL DE INVESTIGACIÓN (AEI) - MINISTERIO DE CIENCIA, INNOVACIÓN y UNIVERSIDADES (MICIU) and ERDF/EU  (European Union)
Start date:  2026 September 1st
End date:    2029 August 31st
Keywords:  Perceptive 6G networks, Integrated sensing and communications, Advanced signal processing, Non-coherent MIMO, Mobility-robust waveforms, Modular antenna arrays, Physical-layer security, Sparse sensing and localization, Asynchronous random access

Principal Investigators:  Jordi Borras Pino  Francesc Molina

Participants:  Meritxell Lamarca Orozco  Jaume Riba Sagarra  Josep Sala Alvarez  Gregori Vazquez Grau  Javier Villares Piera
                          Albert Guillén i Fàbregas  Hamdi Joudeh

Partners:        Universidad de Vigo   Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya

Reserach Collaborations:
     - University of Vigo
     - University of Cambridge
     - Eindhoven University Technology

This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities through project
ASPEN (PID2025-167766OA-C22), funded by MICIU / AEI / 10.13039/501100011033 and by ERDF/EU.

Summary
The current trend in wireless technology is clearly oriented toward the reinvention of cellular networks, driving them toward a deeper understanding of their environment and operational context. This perceptive capability provides immediate benefits: information obtained from spectrum sensing and detailed radio maps enables a much more efficient use of scarce frequency resources, while the emerging integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) paradigm not only promises improvements in data transfer performance, but also enables innovative applications based on precise sensing capabilities directly embedded into future wireless infrastructure. However, this move toward new perceptive functions continuously increases the demands placed on networks, making sustained advances in data rate, latency, coverage area, reliability, and energy efficiency necessary. The ASPEN project is strategically designed to address this complex landscape through two main, complementary objectives. First, it tackles the design of the core elements of the communication transceiver, seeking an optimal balance between high data rates, sensing accuracy, and efficient use of available resources. This work includes the analysis and proposal of new multicarrier and chirp-based waveforms that are efficient both in spectrum usage and sensing accuracy; the development of modulation and decoding protocols for uncoordinated multiple-access systems, capable of operating in scenarios with many users and limited channel knowledge; and the creation of information-theoretic tools aimed at ensuring that transceivers remain robust even under channel uncertainty. Second, ASPEN investigates robust, low-complexity signal processing solutions for these perceptive networks, ensuring both efficiency and security, and validating all techniques under realistic implementation constraints. This objective is structured along three lines: signal processing methodologies for ISAC, especially for simultaneous transmission and reception (full-duplex) operation, with particular emphasis on short-packet communications and on security and privacy aspects; new beamforming designs adapted to practical antenna array architectures that support and enhance perceptive communications; and processing algorithms capable of efficiently extracting physical-layer environmental calibration parameters and exploiting them to improve system performance. To tackle these challenges, ASPEN is organized into two individual subprojects with identical objectives, whose activities will be carried out collaboratively by the research teams of both universities across all tasks. This strategy aims to assemble the critical mass of researchers with extensive experience and diverse backgrounds, typically in closely related research areas, yet with different trajectories, specificities, and skills in applying statistical signal processing methods to communications, interference cancellation, and demonstrator development, required by the various tasks of the project.

• WP0: Coordination and Management
• T1.1 Waveforms
• T1.2 Uncoordinated Multiple Access
• T1.3 Robuts Transceivers
• T2.1 Integrated Sensing and Communication
• T2.2 Multiantenna Techniques
• T2.3 Estimation and Learning

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

YEAR 2026

• [Conf] F. Molina and A. Guillén i Fàbregas, "Information-Spectrum Formula for the Mismatch Capacity under Stochastic Decoding", accepted at 2026 IEEE Information Theory Workshop, November 2026, Arizona (USA)

Complementary Presentations

More information
Send an email to francesc.molina [at] upc.edu