ACCEPTED FROM OPEN CALL
Envisioning Device-to-Device Communications in 6G
Shangwei Zhang, Jiajia Liu, Hongzhi Guo, Mingping Qi, and Nei Kato
Abstract
To fulfill the requirements of various emerg-
ing applications, the future sixth generation (6G)
mobile network is expected to be an innately intel-
ligent, highly dynamic, ultradense heterogeneous
network that interconnects all things with extreme-
ly low-latency and high speed data transmission. It
is believed that artificial intelligence (AI) will be the
most innovative technique that can achieve intelli-
gent automated network operations, management
and maintenance in future complex 6G networks.
Driven by AI techniques, device-to-device (D2D)
communication will be one of the pieces of the 6G
jigsaw puzzle. To construct an efficient implemen-
tation of intelligent D2D in future 6G, we outline
a number of potential D2D solutions associating
with 6G in terms of mobile edge computing, net-
work slicing, and non-orthogonal multiple access
(NOMA) cognitive networking.
Introduction
The wireless communication system has been devel-
oped and regenerated for almost every decade to
meet the ever-increasing network requirements.
Until now, 5G has already been standardized in
2018 and its commercial deployment was rolled
out at the end of 2019. However, it is envisioned
that 5G cannot fulfill the requirements of emerging
Internet of Everything applications like augmented
reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), and mixed reality
(MR), which require a convergence of communica-
tion, sensing, control, and computing functionalities
[1]. In addition, new services, such as holographic
communications, high-precision manufacturing, sus-
tainable development and smart environments, and
enhanced energy efficiency, cannot be efficient-
ly offered by the current development of 5G net-
works. To fulfill such challenging requirements
mentioned above, a novel network architecture of
the future sixth generation (6G) mobile network
is required. To date, debates on 6G have already
been carried out in many countries and organiza-
tions. It might be too early to give an exact defini-
tion of 6G, nevertheless, most researchers agree
that 6G will be an innately intelligent, highly dynam-
ic, extremely heterogeneous and ultradense net-
work that interconnects all things. More concretely,
6G is expected to support a data rate that is 100 to
1000 times faster than 5G (i.e., 1Tbps) with end-to-
end latency less than 1 msec [2].
Based on the existing 5G architecture, current
research trends have shown that 6G network archi-
Shangwei Zhang, Jiajia Liu, Hongzhi Guo and Mingping Qi are with National Engineering Laboratory for Integrated Aero-Space-Ground-Ocean Big Data
Digital Object Identifier: Application Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an, Shaanxi, P.R.China (Jiajia Liu is the corresponding author).
10.1109/MNET.001.1900652 Nei Kato is with the Graduate School of Information Sciences, Tohoku University.
86 0890-8044/20/$25.00 © 2020 IEEE
Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
tecture at least has the following characteristics:
space-air-terrestrial-sea integrated (SATSI), artificial
intelligence (AI) driven, higher frequency bands,
ultradense heterogeneous, green energy, security
and privacy. For the sake of ubiquitous connec-
tion, SATSI network architecture will enable flexible
and efficient connection of trillion-level objects in
terrestrial, aerial, space, and sea domains. To main-
tain network systems with ultra high data rate and
extraordinarily low latency, 6G will utilize much
broader frequency bands, including sub-terahertz
and terahertz (THz) bands as well as visible light
communication (VLC). Since higher frequency
bands inevitably suffer from high path-loss, the data
transmission distance will become much shorter.
As a result, the 6G network will become extremely
dense. Moreover, high-speed and low-latency D2D
communication and ultra-massive MIMO commu-
nication will be the indispensable part of 6G net-
works to cope with the limited distance. Therefore,
ultradense heterogenous networks are considered
to be one of the key components of 6G.
Although 5G has benefited greatly from ultra-
dense networks and device-to-device (D2D) com-
munication, further network densification in 6G
will encounter many serious problems and chal-
lenges [3], like severe interference, very complex
resource management, a vast amount of signaling,
prohibitively high cost and energy consumption.
Toward this end, researchers have pointed out that
the utilization of AI techniques can help network
operators to realize intelligent automated network
operation, management and maintenance [4]. It is
believed that AI will be the most innovative tech-
nique for 6G [5]. By sensing and network big data
training, AI techniques like machine learning (ML)
will make complex 6G networks more intelligent
and can achieve a high level of efficient network
management and optimization, such as network
environment sensing, status predicting, proactive
configuring, dynamic optimizing, self-healing, etc.
AI will gradually migrate from cloud to network
edge, wherein multi-level AI will be employed [6].
It is noted that mobile user equipments (UEs)
like smartphones are becoming more and more
powerful since they are integrated with power-
ful high-end processors, rich storage resources,
long battery lifetime, multiple sensors, etc. They
can be regarded as personal mobile workstations
that enable light-level on-device AI processing
for intelligent networking in the future [2]. Many
researchers have pointed out that the utilization
of on-device AI can dynamically sense local net-
IEEE Network • May/June 2020
 Full-Frequency Radio Access

300MHz 30GHz 300GHz 3THz 300THz 400THz 790THz

Radio/TV Microwave mmWave THz Wave IR UV
Intra-Plane
kHz MHz GHz THz
Two-Hop D2D D2D Clustering
Global Coverage Space-Air-Terrestrial-Sea
Integrated Networks

Fast Accurate
Beamforming
Core Intra-Ship D2D
Cloud
Edge
Internet IR
AI
NFV SDN

Technical Objectives of 6G
Peak Data Rate (≥ 1Tbps) Energy Efficiency (100×)
Latency (≤ 1msec) Network Density (107 Nodes/km2)
Mobility (≥1000km/h) Area Traffic Capacity 1Gbps/m2
Average Data Rate (1Gbps) Spectrum Efficiency (5-10×)
Data Training

Local Full
AI Center Application
Feature
Scalable
Extraction
On-Device Machine Learning AR/VR/MR High Precision Manufacturing M2M/D2D (Smart Home/Healthcare)

FIGURE 1. The D2D communications in future space-air-terrestrial-sea integrated 6G network.

work environment, efficiently and optimally adjust
network parameters to meet different network
application requirements.
Employing AI in D2D will lead to new oppor-
tunities and challenges in future 6G networks. As
motivated by the aforementioned studies, we in
this paper envision a number of potential intelli-
gent D2D solutions associating with 6G in terms
of intelligent mobile edge computing (MEC), net-
work slicing as well as non-orthogonal multiple
access (NOMA) cognitive networking.
Architectures and Developing Trends of
6G Networks
Space-Air-Terrestrial-Sea Integrated Networks
Note that relying only on current terrestrial networks
cannot fulfill the requirements of extremely broad
coverage and ubiquitous connectivity. Therefore,
6G will further integrate sea/underwater networks
with respect to 5G space-air-terrestrial networks,
so as to support various applications and maintain
ubiquitous mobile ultrabroadband everywhere. As
shown in Fig. 1, a typical 6G SATSI network con-
tains four parts: a space network composed of
interconnected satellites with different orbits; an air
network containing a high altitude platform like an
airplane [7], air ship, and low altitude unmanned
aerial vehicle (UAV) and flying base stations (BSs);
a heterogeneous ultradense terrestrial network
that includes the core network (CN), cloud, edge,
and M2M communication networks; a sea-based
network that contains shortwave communication,
ultrashort-wave communication, submarine opti-
cal network and underwater acoustic network that
provide wireless connections to those equipments
over the sea and underwater area. It is believed that
terrestrial network will still be the most important
part for providing wireless mobile services for most
human activities [8].
The SATSI network can make full use of the
characteristics of global network coverage, full-fre-
quency radio transmission and full application to
achieve seamless high-speed communication in
space, air, terrestrial and sea domains, such as
automated driving, high precision manufacturing,
smart home/healthcare, AR, VR, MR, etc. With
the participation of AI techniques, D2D commu-
nication will be employed to support low latency
and high speed data transmission in different net-
work scenarios, such as intra-plane two-hop D2D,
intra-ship multi-hop D2D, D2D with fast accurate
beamforming in vehicular networks. In future 6G,
massive D2D clusters will exist in local area due
to the aggregation and social behavior of human
beings. Users in each D2D cluster can be man-
aged and served via D2D connection.
Extremely Heterogeneous and Ultradense
Terrestrial Networks
As wireless transmission distance will become
much shorter in 6G, D2D communication is envi-
sioned to continuously evolve into the 6G wireless
communication systems to efficiently support a
much larger and more diverse set of UEs and appli-
cations. Ultradense network integrated with D2D
communication is considered as one of the pieces
of the 6G jigsaw puzzle, making 6G terrestrial net-

IEEE Network • May/June 2020 87

Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 Access System Frequency Band Network Transmission Achievable Application
Mode type Range Rate scenarios
2G 890-960MHz GSM 35km 270.83kb/s Macro Cell
3G 1.94-2.145GHz WCDMA 10km 5.75-14.4Mb/s Macro Cell
4G 0.7-3.6GHz LTE/LTE-A 1-5km up to 1Gb/s Macro Cell
5G 30-300GHz mmWave < 1km multiple Gb/s Massive MIMO, Macro/Pico Cell
Licensed 6G 0.3-3THz THz wave < 1km up to 1Tb/s Small Cell
Band
WMAN 2.3-3.6GHz WiMax 50km around 100Mb/s Macro Cell
IoT 0.703-2.2GHz NB-IoT < 10km 160-250kb/s M2M
0.3-4GHz (UHF) L/S GEO/LEO up to 10Mb/s Space-air/ground/sea,
Satellite 4-30GHz (SHF) C/X/Ku/K/Ka GEO/MEO/LEO up to 1Gb/s Inter-Satellites, GNSS,
30-75GHz (EHF) Ka/Q/U/V MEO/LEO multiple Gb/s Feeder Link
2.4GHz,5GHz WiFi around 120m 11-600Mb/s Pico/Femto Cell, UAV
WLAN/WPAN 2.4-2.4835GHz Bluetooth 100m around 1Mb/s M2M
430-790THz Visible Light < 100m (LOS) up to multiple Gb/s Micro Cell
Unlicensed
Band 0.125-13.56MHz RFID/NFC 10cm 1-424kb/s M2M
IOT 300-400THz IrDA 10m around 4Mb/s M2M
5.85-5.925GHz DSRC (IoV) around 1km around 27Mb/s V2V, V2I, V2R, V2P

TABLE 1. Frequency resources available for D2D communications.

work inevitably be an ultradense heterogeneous
network structure. Note that further network den-
sification will lead to performance degradation due
to the severe interference, prohibitively high cost
and energy consumption [3]. Ultradense networks
may lead to frequent handover for high speed
moving UEs. As THz bands signal has very strong
directional characteristics, the transmitter beam
should perfectly point to the receiver antenna to
successfully deliver the information, which makes
the network management a very challenging task.
Accordingly, emerging new interference manage-
ment approaches, channel allocation scheme as
well as spectral efficiency are still essential in 6G
ultradense heterogeneous networks. Considering
the frequent handover, interference and energy
consumption problem in 6G ultradense network,
D2D and NOMA based communication could be
one feasible solution in future.
Innately Intelligent and Highly Dynamic Network
As 6G network will be much more complex
and dynamic than the preceding generations of
wireless networks, traditional network manage-
ment methods will become untenable. Hence,
intelligent network management and optimiza-
tion approaches shall be employed to fulfill the
different QoS demands. Over the past decade,
many types of ML algorithms [5], like super-
vised learning, unsupervised learning, reinforce-
ment learning, etc., were adopted for intelligent
resource allocation, network optimization, small
BSs or UAVs deployment, network design, etc.
It is believed that AI-enabled radio access and
core networks will allow future networks to sense
and learn from the environment, make decisions
through big data training, automatically predict
and adapt the network changes, and achieve opti-
mal performance by self-configuration.
It is envisioned that multi-level distributed AI
will be employed to provide global intelligent
management of 6G networks. Specifically, the
global AI center will be deployed in the core net-
work, while the local AI center can be embed-
ded into traditional MBSs or MEC servers so as
to provide AI proceeding on local network man-
agement. Note that UEs like smart phones may
provide opportunities for on-device data training,
which can sense and learn from the local channel
pattern, traffic pattern, moving trajectory, etc.,
to understand the features of user behavior and
predict the network status. In future 6G, global
AI, local AI and on-device AI will cooperate and
leverage one another’s advantages to maintain
the network operation and optimization.
Evolution of Terminal User Equipment in 6G
From Mobile Phone to Mobile Workstation
Considering the growth of computational power
provided by Moore’s law and future 6G commu-
nication requirements, it can be seen that UEs
will equipped with powerful high-end processors,
extraordinary rich storage resources, plenty of
sensors and ultra-long lifetime batteries (ideally
unlimited). Combined with breakthrough bat-
tery technologies and intelligent operating sys-
tems, the power of such UE can be equivalent
to a mobile computer workstation with immense
computational power, high-speed data process-
ing and networking capability. We envision that
future UEs will be designed as a type of hand-
held mobile computer workstation that can per-
form intense processes like machine learning,
environment sensing, holography processing, AR/
VR cloud gaming and photonic computing, while
keeping the same thin and portable designs as a
phone. Moreover, future UEs will be embedded
with multiple radio interfaces with full frequency
radio access capability that can connect to various
network systems with different QoS requirements.
Table I summarizes the frequency resources avail-
able for D2D communications [9]–[11]. One can
see from Fig. 2 that future UEs can either connect
to the nearby devices via short range communica-
tion technologies or establish long range links via

88 IEEE Network • May/June 2020

Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
satellite communications, thus ensuring the ubiq- On-device Machine Learning Environment Sensing
uitous connection from anywhere at any time. Health Skills y
Community
Equipped with plenty of sensors and powerful
processors, future UEs have the real time collection
capability for mapping and sensing the world, such
Spectrum Speed Weather Wind
as environment sensing and wireless reality sensing.
As higher frequency bands will be exploited in 6G,
the antenna size on these spectrum bands can be
so small that multiple antennas can be easily embed- S i li i
Socializing Location
ded in small size UEs or even in smaller IoT devices
which may take advantage of the merits of MIMO
technologies [12]. Moreover, THz will enable new
sensing applications in multiple domains like security Message Hobby Trail Wireless Reality Sensing
sensing, gesture detection, body scanning, health-
care monitoring, and 3D mapping and imaging. Distributed Machine Learning 3D Full-Frequency Radio Access
Imaging LoRA C/Ku/Ka bands DSRC
From Smart Mobile Phone to AI-Driven Mobile Phone Global AI Center Model
The growing computation and storage power of Training
devices can achieve on-device AI by local data
training. According to [11], smart phones will have Feedback
computational capabilities that are on the order Local model
of the human brain in the near future. Due to the Inte
Intelligent
update Radio
R Bluetooth
IrDA
employment of higher frequency bands, UEs may Feedback
be equipped with multiple antennas and support
full duplex transmission, high speed data transmis- On-device
sion, a large volume of data caching, MIMO com- model update
munication, cognitive and sensing ability. All the Local AI Center THz band VLC mmWave
above characteristics enable UEs to have AI ability
to perform on-device ML so as to predict moving FIGURE 2. Illustration of the intelligent user equipment in 6G.
trace, common interest content, sensing local envi-
ronment, etc. Therefore, mobile phones in 6G will is an effective way to enhance the network edge
shift from smart phones to AI-driven phones. computing. As shown in Fig. 3, each UE in this
Driven by on-device AI techniques, future mobile architecture has a certain scale of computing and
phones will be designed not only for personal use, communication capability and can proceed task
but also for intelligent networking. It helps to enable executions when being idle. As the capability of
proactive 6G network management and automated single UE is relatively weak, computational inten-
network configuration, thus to improve quality of sive tasks may inevitably be allocated to multiple
experience (QoE) and quality of service (QoS) for UEs. Fortunately, the utilization of THz band D2D
network services. However, relying solely on on-de- communication would make the computing down-
vice AI is far from enough to predict and manage loading and uploading between two close UEs near-
the large domain dynamic networks. Local AI will real-time. Thus, we envision future 6G will employ
be employed for local network data training, so as the capacity of D2D clusters for edge computing.
to intelligently utilize the collaboration among edge The key and difficult point to employ D2D-en-
UEs and the local AI center to exchange the learn- hanced MEC lies in the optimal management and
ing parameters for a better training and inference allocation of network communication and compu-
of the models. In terms of data privacy and security, tation resources. We envision that AI techniques
federated learning, which can keep data training at will be employed to make the resource allocation
each UE, will be employed to learn a shared global and optimization intelligent. As illustrated in Fig. 3,
model from edge UEs. each edge server combines local AI and MEC serv-
er together to intelligently provide services to local
AI-Driven D2D Communication in 6G edge UEs. The local AI can be the central server
The key feature of D2D communication in 6G is to for coordinating the local resource of UEs or D2D
leverage the shared information from the local and clusters. By merging the uploaded on-device AI
on-device AI to extend UEs’ view scope and increase training data from UEs, local AI can intelligently
their awareness of the local network environment. To manage network resources, including sensing and
construct an efficient implementation of intelligent predicting available dynamic D2D clusters’ resourc-
D2D in future 6G networks, we forecast that at least es, optimizing and balancing the resource of the
the following key techniques should be developed. whole MEC systems, making decisions on task allo-
cation. For instance, if the capability of a single UE
Intelligent D2D-Enhanced Mobile Edge Computing cannot support a computation-intensive task, then
The ever-increasing demand in data traffic and com- the local AI will allocate the task to local D2D clus-
putation imposes a huge amount of workload on ters via D2D or cellular links. If both UEs and D2D
cloud and MEC servers. Relying only on the joint clusters fail to support the tasks, then the tasks will
cloud and MEC paradigm cannot fulfill the QoE be allocated to edge or cloud servers with more
requirements of UEs. Note that the computation powerful computing capability [13].
and storage resources of UEs are far from the
requirement of users. Additionally, the end-to-end D2D-Enabled Intelligent Network Slicing
transmission time will be greatly reduced due to the In 5G, a network slice (NS) is a basic substrate
extremely high data rate in 6G, resulting in lots of offered by public land mobile network (PLMN) which
idle UEs. To make full use of the spare resources is supplied by mobile network operators or infrastruc-

IEEE Network • May/June 2020 89

Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.

Global Intelligent Task Scheduling
AI/Cloud Task Sequence
Center
Task Allocation
Core
Network
To UE
D2D Link
Local
AI/MEC Cooperation
Servers To D2D Cluster
D2D/Cellular Link
Access Upload
Points To Edge Server
D2D/Cellular Link
Edge
D2D To Cloud
UEs
Cluster D2D/Cellular Link
Idle UE Busy UE AI Training Data Resources
FIGURE 3. Illustration of D2D-enhanced mobile edge computing. By merging
the uploaded on-device AI training data from UEs, local AI can intelligently
offload tasks to D2D clusters via D2D or cellular links for edge computing.
ture providers. Network resources owned by private
third-party actors outside of operator infrastructures
can also be involved for network slicing [14]. Note
that a large number of dynamic D2D clusters can pro-
vide physical and/or virtual infrastructure resources,
such as computation, network, memory, and storage,
which may give rise to a proliferation of resources
at the network edge. In Fig. 4, we envision that the
D2D enabled intelligent network slicing approach
will help network operators to efficiently federate and
integrate network resources including PLMN, private
third party and D2D clusters at the network edge.
Different from PLMN and third party, the formation
of D2D clusters are highly dynamic and opportunis-
tic, making network slicing a very challenging task.
Accordingly, multi-level AI including global AI, local
AI and on-device AI, will be used for discovering and
managing a large number of D2D clusters, thus to
proceed real-time dynamic network slicing.
Specifically, there exists an integration layer
wherein multi-level AI will be employed for real-
time resource sensing and predicting to discover
the dynamic resources that are candidates to be
integrated. By merging the updates of on-device
AI models from UEs and exchanging the learn-
ing parameters, local AI can predict and provide
real-time views of dynamic resource information,
including available infrastructure resources and
localization of available D2D clusters. As infrastruc-
ture resources may come from different provid-
ers or stretch across greater geographical areas,
AI techniques are also employed for intelligent
resource aggregating and evaluating, as well as
configuring and monitoring, thus to establish logical
interconnection of the dynamic physical resourc-
es for operators. Then, the virtualization layer
abstracts and decouples the physical resources in
terms of virtual network functions (VNFs). With the
help of multi-level AI, intelligent management and
orchestration of virtual resources can be achieved
by monitoring and evaluating the status of underly-
ing resource and network slices, as well as predict-
ing the requirements of upcoming services through
90
Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
intelligent service to resource mapping. By intelli-
gently stitching physical network functions (PNFs)
and VNFs, the federated network slice instance can
be efficiently created and/or dynamically adjusted
to fulfill diverse service requirements without nega-
tively affecting other slice instances.
NOMA and D2D Based Cognitive Networking
As an emerging multiple-access technique,
NOMA can be integrated into cognitive radio
networks (CRNs) to improve spectrum efficien-
cy, user fairness and connectivity density. By
employing NOMA, secondary UEs can efficiently
cooperate with primary UEs to obtain spectrum
access opportunities. Apart from CRNs, combin-
ing NOMA with D2D allows one D2D transmit-
ter to communicate with several D2D receivers
via NOMA, so as to achieve better D2D perfor-
mance gains. Under this circumstance, D2D users
are clustered not only according to the aggrega-
tion and social behavior of human beings, but
also through the NOMA way. As shown in Fig.
5, D2D-aided cooperative NOMA is employed
in primary networks by selecting proper UEs as
NOMA relays that establish D2D connections to
UEs in the nearby NOMA groups. With the help
of Local AI and on-device AI, NOMA relays can
be intelligently chosen by utilizing techniques like
wireless cognition, intelligent user pairing, channel
estimation, and hyper-accurate position location.
In secondary networks, UEs in each cluster are
intelligently managed and served via NOMA, while
different D2D clusters employ orthogonal multiple
access (OMA) for simultaneously communicating.
Engineers will encounter many challenges when
employing NOMA in D2D, such as complex pre-
coding mechanism in each NOMA group and
co-channel interference management among UEs in
the same subchannel. To this end, accurate beam-
forming based on intelligent channel estimation and
dynamic precoding techniques will be employed to
compensate for the additional power requirements
that are caused by the increased interference and
noise. Recently, the concept of delta-OMA (D-OMA)
technique has been proposed for large scale concur-
rent access in 6G [15]. Although designed for cellular
networks, D-OMA will be employed for D2D clusters
in secondary networks to further improve network
performance via accurate beamforming. The accu-
rate beamforming can be achieved by utilizing mul-
tiple narrow beamwidth antennas or high frequency
bands signal with strong directional characteristics.
It can result in a highly dominant line-of.sight (LOS)
component which is much stronger than the non-
LOS (NLOS) paths. The highly correlated channels
at higher frequencies will make the use of D-OMA
more attractive at higher frequencies.
Conclusion
We have envisioned in this article the D2D com-
munications in future 6G. Based on the developing
trend of potential 6G architecture and the evolu-
tion of future terminal user equipment, we focus
our attention on conducting efficient implemen-
tation of intelligent D2D in future 6G communi-
cation systems, including D2D-enhanced mobile
edge computing, D2D-enabled intelligent network
slicing, and NOMA and D2D based cognitive net-
working. We hope our discussion will serve as a
guideline for future D2D development in 6G.
IEEE Network • May/June 2020
 Acknowledgment Intelligent Service to
This work was supported by the National Natural Sci- Network Resource Mapping
Network Slice Instances
ence Foundation of China (61771374, 61771373,
Slice
61801360, and 61601357); and in part by the Fun- Instance Network Slice Functions
damental Research Fund for the Central Universities Layer Data Plane
(3102019PY005, and 310201905200001). Intelligent Stitching
Control Plane
References
[1] J. Liu et al., “Device-to-Device Communication in LTE-Ad- Intelligent
vanced Networks: A Survey,” IEEE Commun. Surveys Tuts., Virtual Virtual Virtual Virtual Management and
vol. 17, no. 4, 2015, pp. 1923–40. Resources Computing Storage Network Orchestration
[2] K. B. Letaief et al., “The Roadmap to 6G: AI Empowered
Wireless Networks,” IEEE Commun. Mag., vol. 57, no. 8,
Aug. 2019, pp. 84–90. Virtualization SDN
Layer NFV Intelligent Resource
[3] K. David et al., “Defining 6G: Challenges and Opportunities
[from the guest editors],” IEEE Veh. Tech. Mag., vol. 14, no. Sensing, Predicting
3, Sept. 2019, pp. 14–16. Integration AI-Enabled Resource AI-Enabled Resource
and Discovering
[4] W. Xu et al., “Intelligent Link Adaptation in 802.11 Vehicular Layer Aggregation and Evaluation Configuring and Monitoring
Networks: Challenges and Solutions,” IEEE Commun. Stand.
Mag., vol. 3, no. 1, 2019, pp. 12–18.
AI
[5] M. Elsayed and M. Erol-Kantarci, “AI-Enabled Future Wireless Global AI
Networks: Challenges, Opportunities, and Open Issues,”
IEEE Veh. Tech. Mag., vol. 14, no. 3, Sept. 2019, pp. 70–77. Physical Stadium
[6] B. Zong et al., “6G Technologies: Key Drivers, Core Require- Layer Edge Local AI
ments, System Architectures, and Enabling Technologies,” 6G Core cloud
IEEE Veh. Tech. Mag., vol. 14, no. 3, Sept. 2019, pp. 18– 27. Network 6G RAN Mall D2D Cluster
[7] X. Huang et al., “Airplane-Aided Integrated Networking for Public Land Mobile Network Third Party End UEs On-Device AI
6G Wireless: Will it Work?” IEEE Veh. Tech. Mag., vol. 14, no.
3, Sept. 2019, pp. 84–91.
[8] Z. Zhang et al., “6G Wireless Networks: Vision, Require- FIGURE 4. Illustration of D2D-enabled intelligent network slicing structure, where-
ments, Architecture, and Key Technologies,” IEEE Veh. Tech.
Mag., vol. 14, no. 3, Sept. 2019, pp. 28–41.
in multi-level AI will be used for federating and integrating network resourc-
[9] M. L. Roberts et al., “Evolution of the Air Interface of Cellu- es provided by a large number of dynamic D2D clusters.
lar Communications Systems toward 4G Realization,” IEEE
Commun. Surveys Tuts., vol. 8, no. 1, 2006, pp. 2–23. D2D-Aided
[10] R. Radhakrishnan et al., “Survey of Inter-Satellite Communi- Cooperative NOMA
cation for Small Satellite Systems: Physical Layer to Network (Primary Networks)
Layer View,” IEEE Commun. Surveys Tuts., vol. 18, no. 4,
2016, pp. 2442–2473.
[11] T. S. Rappaport et al., “Wireless Communications and Appli-
cations above 100 GHz: Opportunities and Challenges for 6G Hyper-Accurate
and Beyond,” IEEE Access, vol. 7, Jun. 2019, pp. 78 729–78 757. Position Location NOMA
[12] F. Zhou et al., “State of the Art, Taxonomy, and Open
Issues on Cognitive Radio Networks with NOMA,” IEEE Intelligent
Wireless Commun., vol. 25, no. 2, Apr. 2018, pp. 100–08. NOMA User Pairing
[13] F. Tang et al., “Future Intelligent and Secure Vehicular Net-
work towards 6G: Machine Learning Approaches,” Proc.
IEEE, DOI:10.1109/JPROC.2019.2954595. Intelligent
[14] H. Khelifi et al., “Bringing Deep Learning at the Edge of Channel Estimation
Information-Centric Internet of Things,” IEEE Commun. Lett., Beamwidth Selection
vol. 23, no. 1, Jan. 2019, pp. 52–55.
[15] Y. Al-Eryani and E. Hossain, “The D-OMA Method for Massive
Multiple Access in 6G: Performance, Security, and Challenges,” UE4
D-OMA U
UE5
IEEE Veh. Tech. Mag., vol. 14, no. 3, Sept. 2019, pp. 92–99.
Biographies Accurate
Beamforming
Shangwei Zhang (S’15-M’20) received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. D-OMA UE7
degrees in computer science and technology from Xidian Univer- Dynamic UE6
sity in 2007, 2011, and 2019, respectively. He is currently an asso- UE
UE3
Precoding
ciate professor with the School of Cybersecurity, Northwestern
Polytechnical University. His research interests cover a wide range
Power Power
UE1
of areas including wireless and mobile ad hoc networks, space-air- UE2 UE3
ground integrated networks, D2D, MIMO, IoT, 5G, etc.
NOMA UE5 UE7
UE2
Jiajia Liu (S’11-M’12-SM’15) is currently a full professor with the NOMA/D-OMA Based UE1 UE4 UE6
School of Cybersecurity, Northwestern Polytechnical University. D2D Clustering Frequency
Frequency
His research interests cover wireless mobile communications, (Secondary Networks)
FiWi, IoT, etc. He has published more than 130 peer-reviewed NOMA D-OMA
papers in many prestigious IEEE journals and conferences, and
currently serves as an editor for IEEE Network, TWC, TVT, and
FIGURE 5. Illustration of the NOMA and D2D based cognitive networking.
TCCN, and as a guest editor for IEEE IoT Journal and TETC. He is
a Distinguished Lecturer of IEEE ComSoc. sity, China, in 2019. He is now working as an assistant professor
at Northwestern Polytechnical University. His research interests
Hongzhi Guo (S’07-M’16) received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. include public key cryptography especially ECC, cryptographic
degrees in computer science and technology from Harbin Insti- protocol and network security, etc.
tute of Technology in 2004, 2006, and 2011, respectively. He is
currently an associate professor with the School of Cybersecuri- Nei Kato (A03-M’04-SM’05-F13) is currently a full profes-
ty, Northwestern Polytechnical University. His research interests sor at GSIS, Tohoku University. He currently serves as the
cover a wide range of areas including MEC, AI, FiWi, IoT, 5G, Vice-President–Member & Global Activities for IEEE Com-
smart grid, etc. He has published more than 30 peer-reviewed Soc, Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Tech-
papers in many prestigious IEEE journals and conferences, and nology, and Associate Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Internet of
currently serves as an editor for the International Journal of Mul- Things Journal. He has also served as the Chair of the SSC
timedia Intelligence and Security. and AHSN Technical Committees of IEEE ComSoc. He is a
Distinguished Lecturer of IEEE ComSoc and the Vehicular
Mingping Qi received his Ph.D. degree in applied mathematics Technology Society. He is a Fellow of The Engineering Acad-
from the School of Mathematics and Statistics of Wuhan Univer- emy of Japan and IEICE.

IEEE Network • May/June 2020 91

Authorized licensed use limited to: Egyptian Knowledge Bank. Downloaded on February 10,2021 at 12:33:24 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.