mmwave Testbeds and Prototypes Opportunities and Challenges Ian C. Wong, Ph.D. Senior Manager, Advanced Wireless Research ni.com
Challenges to mmwave Prototyping Hardware Performance Flexibility/Scalability Availability Cost Software Skills gap / learning curve Training and support Longevity Real-time reference design availability
NI mmwave Transceiver System (MTS) MTS LabVIEW NR Phase 1 IP <40GHz NR Phase 2 IP >40GHz Channel Sounding 2 GHz Real- Time Bandwidth SISO & MIMO Modular BB, IF, mmwave Frequency options: 28GHz, 73GHz, 60GHz Unified ADE for X86 & FPGA Increased abstraction for rapid development 3 rd party integration CP-OFDM V5G & NR 8x100MHz Component Carriers SISO & MIMO 3 rd Party Phased Array Bidirectional TDD Single Carrier 2 GHz Real- Time Bandwidth Supports 2x2 MIMO Fully Bidirectional TDD Uplink & Downlink Modes AOA/AOD, Doppler Spread, CIR etc.. Flexible Configuration Leverages MTS HW Shipping Shipping LU Availability LU Availability Partner Solution
MTS Configurations 28GHz mmwave Head 60GHz SiBeam RFIC E-Band Custom Front End RFIC or Head Frequency Coverage 27.5-29.5GHz 60.48GHz 62.64GHz 71 76GHz Customer Defined BW 2GHz 1.76GHz 2GHz 2GHz BB BW BB/IF Configuration BB with IF Stage BB IQ Only BB with IF Stage BB with IF Stage BB Only Head Type TX / RX/ TRX RFIC Transceiver TX / RX Customer Defined Antenna Type Coax Connectivity 3 rd Party Horns or Phased Array 12x12 Phased Array Waveguide WR-12 3 rd Party Horns or Phased Array Customer Defined MIMO Order 2x2 or Higher SISO Only 2x2 or Higher Customer Defined SW Options Notes High Performance mmwave Head 2 GHz Single Carrier, 800 MHz OFDM, Channel Sounding Analog Beam Forming in IC High Performance mmwave Head IF: 8.5 to 13.5GHz ADC/DAC 3.072GS/s Availability Today Today (Limited) Today Today (custom)
Over-the-Air Testing for Next-Generation Wireless Kate Remley, NIST Boulder, CO Kate.remley@nist.gov
2 Systems and Subsystems: So Much to Measure mmwave Transistor and NL-Device Measurements mmwave Signal Characterization Channel Measurement and Modeling Massive MIMO and Over-the-Air Test
3 The Measurement Elephant in the Room On-Wafer to OTA No connectors to test: Efficiency Distortion Troubleshooting stages What is the answer??
4 Some Questions for Discussion Devices and Materials: What are prospects for large-signal network analysis at mmwave frequencies? What are issues tuning mmwave harmonics? What is the role of materials measurements in future wireless? Signal characterization: How to handle issues with cascading non-ideal, distortion-inducing instruments (similar to Additive EVM)? How do you see the role of traceability in waveform measurements? Channel measurements: Why is it more important to decouple the antenna from the channel measurement? Will errors in channel sounders be more important at mmwave frequencies? Antennas and Massive MIMO: How does one generate a known test field for multiple-element antenna arrays? What is the role of statistics in testing arrays that operate in more states than you can count? What are issues with distributed array timing and synchronization? The Elephant in the Room: How to merge on-wafer and OTA test to verify performance?
mmwave Testbeds 19 Jul 2017 Robb Shimon, PhD TLO Signal Conditioning Strategy
New Radio Design NR < 6GHz: good channel models, cabled testing channel model NR specifications UE / BS design cabled / OTA test environment NR at mmwave: need OTA, but what are requirements? Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 2
mmwave OTA Challenges RF demod RRM measurements in-band and out-of-band signal characteristics throughput channel model basic, line of sight 3D spatial challenges radiated requirements? frequency bands number of CA combinations UE: 3D rotation UE: head/hand blocking no baseline measurement system accuracy of channel model? generation of verifiable spatial fields? search, acquisition, tracking, handoff, 3D spatial, multi-signal, dynamic no baseline measurement system mobility and the challenge of directional antennas learn to stand fixed wireless learn to walk low-speed mobility learn to run high-speed mobility Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 3
mmwave OTA Testbeds 1. Understand the spatial characteristics of the mmwave propagation channel. Do we? 2. Determine performance characteristics of testbed. Characterization or emulation? Use cases? 3. Design a dynamic, interoperable testbed. Interfaces: world-hardware, hardware-software, software-user? Calibration? Protect IP, yet ability to share results? 4. Implement the design. Industry-academia partnership? Custom or COTS? Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 4
Keysight 5G Testbed SystemVue ESL software phased-array beam-forming kit Signal Studio software 89600 VSA software Signal Optimizer software Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 5
Demonstration 32-Element 5G Phased Array Prof. Rebeiz, U. California, San Diego Key Performance Characteristics: 3 GHz Instantaneous Bandwidth 1.6 Gb/s at 300 m demonstrated* 1.0 Gb/s at +/- 50 degree E-Plane* Supports up to 256 QAM for 6 Gb/s* IC Fabrication Provided by TowerJazz * Results without FEC or Equalization Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 6
Demonstration 64-Element 5G Phased Array Anokiwave and Ball Aerospace Keysight Technologies, Inc Page 7
60 GHz Software Radio Platforms for Prototyping mmwave Networking/Sensing Systems Xinyu Zhang http://xyzhang.ece.wisc.edu/wimi Assistant Prof.@UW-Madison Associate Prof.@UC San Diego
Check: http://xyzhang.ece.wisc.edu/wimi OR Google: 60 GHz software radio Open-source 60 GHz mmwave software-radios WiMi, 2014 OpenMili, 2016 OpenMili 2.0, expected 2017 Baseband BW 245 MHz 1 GHz 100 MHz or 1 GHz Carrier freq 57-64GHz 57-64GHz 57 GHz-64 GHz Antenna horn horn/phased-array phased-array Cost $25k $15k-20k < $10k
Microstrip patch antenna array OpenMili phased-array Transition Power divider network 11mm Phase-shift network
UCSD s 32-element phased-array (60 GHz) 1 cm 5 mm (0.5 λ) 6.3 mm (0.63 λ) 2 2 TRX Chip Antenna feeds Bias/ digital control 4:1 Wilkinson 2:1 Wilkinson (From: Prof. Gabriel Rebeiz)