Enabling Virtual Radio Functions on Software Defined Radio for Future Wireless Networks

• Published in: Wireless personal communications Vol. 113; no. 3; pp. 1579 - 1595
• Main Authors: Liu, Wei, Santos, Joao F., de Belt, Jonathan van, Jiao, Xianjun, Moerman, Ingrid, Marquez-Barja, Johann, DaSilva, Luiz, Pollin, Sofie
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01-08-2020; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Communications Engineering; Computer Communication Networks; Embedded systems; Engineering; Networks; Radio spectra; Reconfiguration; Resource utilization; Signal,Image and Speech Processing; Software radio; Software-defined networking; Spectrum allocation; Wireless networks; Virtual Radio Function; Softwarization; Virtualization; Software-Defined Radio
• ISSN: 0929-6212; 1572-834X
• DOI: 10.1007/s11277-020-07245-x

Today’s wired networks have become highly flexible, thanks to the fact that an increasing number of functionalities are realized by software rather than dedicated hardware. This trend is still in its early stages for wireless networks, but it has the potential to improve the network’s flexibility and resource utilization regarding both the abundant computational resources and the scarce radio spectrum resources. In this work we provide an overview of the enabling technologies for network reconfiguration, such as Network Function Virtualization, Software Defined Networking, and Software Defined Radio. We review frequently used terminology such as softwarization, virtualization, and orchestration, and how these concepts apply to wireless networks. We introduce the concept of Virtual Radio Function, and illustrate how softwarized/virtualized radio functions can be placed and initialized at runtime, allowing radio access technologies and spectrum allocation schemes to be formed dynamically. Finally we focus on embedded Software-Defined Radio as an end device, and illustrate how to realize the placement, initialization and configuration of virtual radio functions on such kind of devices.