A Deep Learning Framework for Blockage Mitigation in mmWave Wireless

Abstract

Millimeter-Wave (mmWave) communication is a key technology to enable next generation wireless systems. However, mmWave systems are highly susceptible to blockages, which can lead to a substantial decrease in signal strength at the receiver. Identifying blockages and mitigating them is thus a key challenge to achieve next generation wireless technology goals, such as enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) and Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communication (URLLC). This thesis proposes several deep learning (DL) frameworks for mmWave wireless blockage detection, mitigation, and duration prediction. First, we propose a DL framework to address the problem of identifying whether the mmWave wireless channel between two devices (e.g., a base station and a client device) is Lineof- Sight (LoS) or non-Line-of-Sight (nLoS). Specifically, we show that existing beamforming training messages that are exchanged periodically between mmWave wireless devices can also be used in a DL model to solve the channel classification problem with no additional overhead. We extend this DL framework by developing a transfer learning model (t-LNCC) that is trained on simulated data and can successfully solve the channel classification problem on any commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) mmWave device with/without any real-world labeled data. The second part of the thesis leverages our channel classification mechanism from the first part and introduces new DL frameworks to mitigate the negative impacts of blockages. Previous research on blockage mitigation has introduced several model and protocol based blockage mitigation solutions that focus on one technique at a time, such as handoff to a different base station or beam adaptation to the same base station. We go beyond those techniques by proposing DL frameworks that address the overarching problem: what blockage mitigation method should be employed? and what is the optimal sub-selection within that method? To do so, we developed two Gated Recurrent Unit (GRU) models that are trained using periodically exchanged messages in mmWave systems. Specifically, we first developed a GRU model that tackled the blockage mitigation problem in single-antenna clients wireless environment. Then, we proposed another GRU model to expand our investigation to cover more complex scenarios where both base stations and clients are equipped with multiple antennas and collaboratively mitigate blockages. Those two models are trained on datasets that are gathered using a commercially available mmWave simulator. Both models achieve outstanding results in selecting the optimal blockage mitigation method with an accuracy higher than 93% and 91% for single-antenna and multiple-antenna clients, respectively. We also show that the proposed methods significantly increases the amount of transferred data compared to several other blockage mitigation policies.