NeTS-NR: Spectrum Teleportation: A Fiber-Aided Wireless Architecture

当前的网络部署趋势表明，光纤基础设施和可用无线频谱存在高度的不对称性。特别是，室内商业和教育环境以及人口密集的城市地区，通常拥有大量未充分利用的光纤，但其无线资源受到有限能量、干扰和严重无线传播问题的挑战。目前无线路由器的特别部署，通常被称为“热点”，是利用这种不对称性的一种手段，它以一种非常本地化的方式将无线流量放置在有线基础设施上。该项目旨在通过现有的、未充分利用的光纤基础设施，在无线领域提供积极的信号采集，从而从根本上扩展热点的概念。技术原理是利用光纤丰富地区的无线设备在物理上接近光纤这一事实来减小无线传输的范围。目前，由于很少有接入点（如基站或无线路由器）将无线信号转换到光纤上，因此没有利用光纤的这种接近性。该项目将考虑使用大量小型、廉价的光纤接入点。特别是，我们的项目将研究在建筑物中使用光纤基础设施，使我们能够第一次有效地使用非常高频率的无线频谱，例如60 GHz，在这种频率下，传播效果只允许非常短的范围。这项工作的主要成果将是通过减少在人口密集的环境中无线传输所需的范围，并允许光纤工厂无处不在地捕获无线信号，从而显著缓解无线资源争夺和能源使用的问题。这项研究将有助于建立新的方法，为无线能量收集提供廉价和简单的光纤接入。

Current trends in network deployment show that there is high asymmetry in fiber infrastructure and in available wireless spectrum. In particular, indoor business and educational environments, as well as dense urban areas, are generally richly endowed with heavily underutilized fiber, but their wireless resources are challenged by limited energy, by interference and by severe wireless propagation issues. The current ad-hoc deployment of wireless routers, commonly termed "hot spots", is a means of exploiting this asymmetry by placing wireless traffic onto the wireline infrastructure in a very localized fashion. This project seeks to extend radically the concept of hotspots by providing aggressive harvesting of the signals in the wireless domain through the existing, underutilized, fiber infrastructure. The technical rationale is to reduce the range of wireless transmissions by making use of the fact that wireless devices in fiber-rich areas are physically close to fiber. Currently, this proximity to fiber is not exploited, since there are very few access points, such as base stations or wireless routers, for translating wireless signals onto the fiber. The project will consider the use of a large number of small, inexpensive points of access to the fiber. In particular, our project will investigate using fiber infrastructure in buildings to allow us, for the first time, to use effectively wireless spectrum at very high frequencies, such as 60 GHz, where propagation effects allow only very short ranges. The main outcomes of this effort will be to alleviate significantly issues of wireless resource contention and energy use, by reducing the range needed for wireless transmission in densely populated environments, and allowing wireless signals to be captured ubiquitously by the fiber plant. This research will help establishing new means providing cheap and simple access onto fiber for wireless energy harvesting.