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The confluence of 5G and AI is transforming wireless networks to deliver diverse services at the edge, driving toward a vision of pervasive distributed intelligence. Future 6G networks will need to deliver quality of experience through seamless integration of communication, computation, and AI. Therefore, networks must become intelligent, distributed, scalable, and programmable platforms across the continuum of data delivery to address the ever increasing service requirements and deployment complexity. We present novel results across three research directions that are expected to be integral to 6G systems, and also discuss newer 6G metrics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are increasingly employed for numerous public and civil applications, such as goods delivery, medicine, surveillance, and telecommunications. For the latter, UAVs with onboard communication equipment may help temporarily offload traffic onto the neighboring cells in fifth-generation networks and beyond (5G+). In this paper, we propose and evaluate the use of UAVs traveling over the area of interest to relieve congestion in 5G+ systems under spontaneous traffic fluctuations. To this end, we assess two inherently different offloading schemes, named routed and controlled UAV ‘bridging’. Using the tools of renewal theory and stochastic geometry, we analytically characterize these schemes in terms of the fraction of traffic demand that can be offloaded onto the UAV ‘bridge’ as our parameter of interest. This framework accounts for the unique features of millimeter-wave (mmWave) radio propagation and city deployment types with potential line-of-sight (LoS) link blockage by buildings. We also introduce enhancements to the proposed schemes that significantly improve the offloading gains. Our findings offer evidence that the UAV ‘bridges’ may be used for efficient traffic offloading in various urban scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To satisfy the stringent capacity and scalability requirements in the fifth generation (5G) mobile networks, bothwireless access and backhaul linksare envisioned to exploit millimeter wave (mmWave) spectrum. Here, similar to the design of access links, mmWave backhaul connections must also address many challenges such as multipath propagation and dynamic link blockage, which calls for advanced solutions to improve their reliability. To address these challenges, 3GPP New Radio technology is considering aflexibleandreconfigurablebackhaul architecture, which includes dynamic link rerouting to alternative paths. In this paper, we investigate the use of aerial relay nodes carried by e.g.,unmanned aerial vehicles(UAVs) to allow for such dynamic routing, while mitigating the impact of occlusions on the terrestrial links. This novel concept requires an understanding of mmWave backhaul dynamics that accounts for: 1) realistic 3-D multipath mmWave propagation; 2) dynamic blockage of mmWave backhaul links; and 3) heterogeneous mobility of blockers and UAV-based assisting relays. We contribute the required mathematical framework that captures these phenomena to analyze the mmWave backhaul operation in characteristic urban environments. We also utilize this framework for a new assessment of mmWave backhaul performance by studying its spatial and temporal characteristics. We finally quantify the benefits of utilizing UAV assistance for more reliable mmWave backhaul. The numerical results are confirmed with 3GPP-calibrated simulations, while the framework itself can aid in the design of robust UAV-assisted backhaul infrastructures in future 5G mmWave cellular. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]