Large-scale distributed antenna systems (LS-DASs) are gaining increasing interest and emerging as highly promising candidates for future wireless communications. To improve the user's quality of service (QoS) in these systems, this study proposes a user cooperation aided clustering approach based on device-centric architectures; it enables multi-user multiple-input multiple-output transmissions with non-reciprocal setups. We actively use device-to-device communication techniques to achieve the sharing of user information and try to form clusters on user side instead of the traditional way that performs clustering on base station (BS) side in data offloading. We further adopt a device-centric architecture to break the limits of the classical BS-centric cellular structure. Moreover, we derive an approximate expression to calculate the user rate for LS-DASs with employment of zero-forcing precoding and consideration of inter-cluster interference. Numerical results indicate that the approximate expression predicts the user rate with a lower computational cost than is indicated by computer simulation, and the proposed approach provides better user experience for, in particular, the users who have unacceptable QoS.

IEEE 802.15.3c has been standardized for wireless personal area networks (WPANs) to realize high-speed wireless communications with 1 Gbps throughput. In this paper we introduce a 802.15.3c WPAN prototype. The introduced 802.15.3c WPAN prototype applies the enhanced MAC functions of data separation on hybrid multiple access, long frame size, aggregation, block acknowledgment, and timing operation, which can realize Gbps throughput in IEEE 802.15.3c. Moreover, the experiment performance studies on the prototype show that around 1.6 Gbps throughput can be successfully achieved and video streaming applications can be accommodated. Also, our studies provide the useful information of MAC capacity for developing the 802.15.3c devices.

This paper proposes an autonomous relay access algorithm that provides an intelligent wireless network structure for inter-vehicle communication systems. The proposed algorithm introduces a special classification among mobile terminals and assigns terminals to one of several terminal groups, which are adaptively and autonomously constructed according to traffic conditions. The proposed algorithm uses the terminal groups to conduct relay access transmission among terminals, and achieves a high rate of successful inter-terminal transmission. Computer simulation confirms that the proposed algorithm can achieve a lower blocking probability than that without a relay access scheme.

Because of its high throughput potentiality on short-range communications and inherent superiority of high precision on ranging and localization, ultra-wideband (UWB) technology has been attracting attention continuously in research and development (R&D) as well as in commercialization. The first domestic regulation admitting indoor UWB in Japan was released by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) in 2006. Since then, several revisions have been made in conjunction with UWB commercial penetration, emerging new trends of industrial demands, and coexistence evaluation with other wireless systems. However, it was not until May 2019 that MIC released a new revision to admit outdoor UWB. Meanwhile, the IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standards Committee has been developing several UWB related standards or amendments accordingly for supporting different use cases. At the time when this paper is submitted, a new amendment known as IEEE 802.15.4z is undergoing drafting procedure which is expected to enhance ranging ability for impulse radio UWB (IR-UWB). In this paper, we first review the domestic UWB regulation and some of its revisions to get a picture of the domestic regulation transition from indoor to outdoor. We also foresee some anticipating changes in future revisions. Then, we overview several published IEEE 802 standards or amendments that are related to IR-UWB. Some features of IEEE 802.15.4z in drafting are also extracted from open materials. Finally, we show with our recent research results that time bias internal a transceiver becomes important for increasing localization accuracy.

A Multipath TCP (MPTCP) connection uses multiple subflows (i.e., TCP flows), each of which traverses over a wireless link, enabling throughput and resilience enhancements in mobile wireless networks. However, to achieve the benefits, the subflows are necessarily initialized (i.e., must complete TCP handshakes) and sequentially attached to the MPTCP connection. In the standard (MPTCPST), MPTCP initialization raises several problems. First, the TCP handshake of opening subflow is generally associated with a predetermined network. That leads to degraded MPTCP performance when the network does not have the lowest latency among available ones. Second, the first subflow's initialization needs to be successful before the next subflow can commence its attempt to achieve initialization. Therefore, the resilience of multiple paths fails when the first initialization fails. This paper proposes a novel method for MPTCP initialization, namely MPTCPSD (i.e., MPTCP with SYN duplication), which can solve the problems. MPTCPSD duplicates the first SYN and attempts to establish TCP handshakes for all subflows simultaneously, hence inherently improves the loss-resiliency. The subflow that achieves initialization first, is selected as the first subflow, consequently solving the first problem. We have implemented and extensively evaluated MPTCPSD in comparison to MPTCPST. In an emulated network, the evaluation results show that MPTCPSD has better performance that MPTCPST with the scenarios of medium and short flows. Moreover, MPTCPSD outperforms MPTCPST in the case that the opening subflow fails. Moreover, a real network evaluation proves that MPTCPSD efficiently selects the lowest delay network among three ones for the first subflow regardless of the preconfigured default network. Additionally, we propose and implement a security feature for MPTCPSD, that prevents the malicious subflow from being established by a third party.

In the 5th generation mobile communication system (5G), super high frequency (SHF) bands such as 28GHz will be used in many scenarios. In Japan, a local 5G working group has been established to apply advanced 5G technologies to private networks and is working to encourage local companies and municipalities to introduce new services for local needs. Meanwhile, the smaller size of the 28GHz band cells creates the difficulties when establishing deployment areas for homogeneous networks. In general, heterogeneous network approach with the combination of macro-cell and micro-cell have been considered practical and applied by the giant telecommunication operators. However, private network operators have difficulty in deploying both micro- and macro-cells due to the cost issue. Without the assistance of macro-cells, local spot cells with a small service area may not be able to start services while high-speed mobile users are staying in the service area. In this paper, we propose a virtual pre-connection scheme allowing fast connection to local spot cells without the assistance of macro-cells. In addition, we confirm that the proposed scheme can reduce the cell search time required when entering a local spot cell from 100 seconds or more to less than 1 second, and can reduce the loss of connection opportunities to local spot cells for high-speed mobile users.

High reliability is required, even in Internet of things (IoT) communications, which are sometimes used for crucial control such as automatic driving devices. Hence, both the uplink (UL) and downlink (DL) communication quality must be improved in the physical layer. In this study, we focus on the communication quality of broadcast DL, which is configured using orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) as a multiplexing scheme and turbo code as forward error correction (FEC). To reduce the frame-error rate (FER) in the DL, we consider two transmit-diversity (TD) techniques that use space-time block code (STBC) or cyclic-delay diversity (CDD). The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the TD performance and to enhance FER performance of CDD up to that of STBC. To achieve this goal, a channel estimation method is proposed to improve FER for CDD. For this purpose, we first evaluate the FER performance of STBC and CDD by performing computer simulations and conducting hardware tests using a fading emulator. Then, we conduct field experiments in the 2.5GHz band. From the results of these evaluations, we confirm that STBC and CDD improved FER compared with single antenna transmission. CDD with the proposed channel estimation method achieved almost the same performance as STBC by accurately estimating the channel frequency response (CFR) and appropriately adjusting the amount of cyclic shift (ACS). When moving a received device around Yokosuka Research Park, STBC and CDD, using spatial diversity with omni antennas for TD, improved the FER from 3.84×10-2 to 1.42×10-2 and 1.19×10-2, respectively.

In this paper, we propose a new content delivery platform on the ITS (Intelligent Transport Systems) road-vehicle communication system on the basis of ROF (Radio over Fiber). The platform is strongly motivated by the ROF communication system capabilities of (1) broadband access, (2) integrated multiple service transmission interface, and (3) simultaneous use of a single and downsized vehicle terminal shared among multiple services based on a multi-mode software radio system. Content is delivered on per reservation basis, as is carefully envisaged as a primary service which is subjected to immaturity of early ITS road-vehicle communication systems, and is provided in limited service areas such as parking on main highways. After the reservation, requested content is stored in a cache connected to a ROF local station via optical fiber. At the designated time, the content is delivered from the cache to a target terminal by way of the ROF local station at high-speed. It can also be done by moving the content from the cache to another cache depending on the target terminal location in a flexible and reliable manner, even if the target terminal could not reach the place at the time designated in the reservation. Such flexibility and reliability are required for consequent practical application, and are provided using information given in the reservations. We implement a preliminary system to evaluate the proposed platform from the viewpoints of (1) processing time from logging into the system for a reservation to delivering content to the target terminal and (2) amount of control traffic required for the delivery. The results show that the proposed platform in which content is delivered from a cache connected with a ROF local station distributed geographically is effective. We also evaluate content delivery throughput using the system connected with an actual ROF local station, and show that the effective throughput is 40 Mbps and the proposed platform is a promising ITS service platform. The paper concludes by discussing future study toward realizing a more promising and practical system.

Among various indoor positioning technologies, impulse-radio UWB is a promising technique to provide indoor positioning and tracking services with high precision. Because UWB regulations turned to imposing restrictions on UWB low band, UWB high band becomes attractive for enabling simple and low cost implementation. However, UWB high band endures much larger propagation loss than UWB low band. In this paper, we propose two separated methods to compensate the deficiency of high band in propagation. With the first method, we bundle several IR-UWB modules to increase the average transmission power, while an adaptive detection threshold is introduced at the receiver to raise receiving sensitivity with the second method. We respectively implement each of these two proposed methods and evaluate their performance through measurements in laboratory. The results show that each of them achieves about 7dB gains in signal power. Furthermore, positioning performance of these two proposed methods are evaluated and compared through field measurements in an indoor sports land.

Digitization of analog terrestrial TV broadcasting has recently been accelerated in many countries, and the effective utilization of vacant frequencies has also been investigated for new systems in each country. In Japan, a portion of vacant frequencies in the VHF-high band was allocated to the public broadband mobile communication (PBB) system. To evaluate the current PBB system and develop future broadband communication systems in this band, it is important to analyze the propagation channel more accurately. In this study, we characterize the propagation channel for 200MHz band broadband mobile communication systems, using measured channel impulse responses (CIRs). In the characterization process, the Saleh-Valenzuela (S-V) model is utilized to extract channel model parameters statistically. When evaluating the fluctuation of path power gain, we also propose to model the fluctuation of path power gain using the generalized extreme value distribution instead of the conventional log-normal distribution. The extracted CIR model parameters are validated by cumulative distribution function of root-means-square delay spread and maximum excess delay, comparing simulation result to measurement result. From the extracted CIR model parameters, we clarified the characteristics of 200MHz band broadband mobile communication systems in non-line-of-sight environments based on S-V model with the proposed channel model.

This paper proposes an intelligent and autonomous radio resource management scheme for a multi-layered cellular system with different assigned bandwidths to achieve flexible and high capacity wireless communication systems under any traffic conditions, especially under nonuniform traffic conditions. In the proposed system, terminals with lower mobility are connected to the wideband microcell systems to achieve higher system capacity, and terminals with higher mobility are connected to the narrowband macrocell systems to reduce intercell hand-off frequency. To flexibly cope with variations of traffic conditions, radio spectrum is adaptively and autonomously shared by both systems, and its control is conducted by each microcell base station. Moreover, at the existence of nonuniform traffic conditions , the proposed system introduces downlink power control for the microcells and graceful degradation thereby achieving high system capacity even under such extraordinary traffic situations . Computer simulation confirms that the proposed scheme can achieve lower blocking probability than the centralized scheme especially under nonuniform traffic conditions.

The number of Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices will increase rapidly. In next-generation mobile communication systems, a base station (BS) must effectively accommodate massive numbers of IoT devices. To address this problem, we have proposed a novel up-link non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) system that can also be utilized for low latency communication. We have developed and evaluated the system through computer simulation. This paper describes experiments conducted on a prototype system in actual environments. The paper shows results of the experiments when 3 fixed user equipments (UEs) and 2 mobile UEs transmitted signals simultaneously to a BS and then the BS separated superimposed signals using successive interference cancellation (SIC). We also evaluated repetition transmission (RT) and space receive diversity (SD) techniques employed to enhance the signal separation performance for NOMA systems. The results of the experiments confirm that the system using neither SD nor RT could separate 3.5 UEs' signals on average while employing either SD or RT could make the number increase to 4.1 and 4.0, respectively. When both SD and RT were employed, the number rose to 4.4.

A variety of mobile data communication services based on cellular phones and the PHS (Personal Handyphone System) have recently been developed and used widely. The maximum transmission rate in public mobile data communication services is currently limited to 64 kbit/s, but higher transmission rate will be needed in order to meet the requirements of mobile multimedia applications. We have therefore developed 384 kbit/s-PHS experimental system that uses the 64 kbit/s PHS data communication protocol (PIAFS) and the PPP Multilink protocol. This paper presents the implementation and performance evaluation of the 384 kbit/s-PHS experimental system. Throughtput performance of the system is evaluated using FTP under various radio propagation environments.

We propose a wideband antenna that has both vertical and horizontal polarization to create access points with enhanced connectivity. The antenna is composed of a rectangular plate and a ground plate, and the rectangular plate is fed sideways from the ground plate. Its -10dB fractional bandwidth is approximately 162%. It is shown that the offset feed of the rectangular plate is important to attain wideband impedance matching and vertical polarized wave. The results of a parametric study to characterize the first- and second-lowest resonant frequencies are presented. Moreover, the behavior of the impedance matching and polarization is interpreted by dividing the current distribution around the feed port on the rectangular plate into the same direction current mode and the opposite direction current mode. The measured results for the return loss and the radiation pattern of a prototype antenna agree well with the simulation results, therefore the wideband property was experimentally confirmed.

Device-to-device (D2D) networks are expected to play a number of roles, such as increasing frequency spectrum efficiency and improving throughput at hot-spots. In this paper, our interest is on the potential of D2D on reducing delivery latency. To enable fast D2D network forming, quick device discovery is essential. For quickening device discovery, we propose a method of defining and using common channel and group channels so as to avoid the channel scan uncertainty faced by the conventional method. Rules for using the common channel and group channels are designed. We evaluate and compare the discovery performance of the proposed method with conventional method by using the superframe structure defined in IEEE 802.15.8 and a general discovery procedure. IEEE 802.15.8 is a standard under development for fully distributed D2D communications. A Netlogo simulator is used to perform step by step MAC simulations. The simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.