IEICE Transactions on Communications
Online ISSN : 1745-1345
Print ISSN : 0916-8516
Volume E101.B, Issue 3
Displaying 1-34 of 34 articles from this issue
Special Section on Network Resource Control and Management for IoT Services and Applications
  • Hideki TODE
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 603
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS
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  • Nirwan ANSARI, Xiang SUN
    Article type: INVITED PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 604-619
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
    JOURNAL FREE ACCESS

    In this paper, we propose a Mobile Edge Internet of Things (MEIoT) architecture by leveraging the fiber-wireless access technology, the cloudlet concept, and the software defined networking framework. The MEIoT architecture brings computing and storage resources close to Internet of Things (IoT) devices in order to speed up IoT data sharing and analytics. Specifically, the IoT devices (belonging to the same user) are associated to a specific proxy Virtual Machine (VM) in the nearby cloudlet. The proxy VM stores and analyzes the IoT data (generated by its IoT devices) in real-time. Moreover, we introduce the semantic and social IoT technology in the context of MEIoT to solve the interoperability and inefficient access control problem in the IoT system. In addition, we propose two dynamic proxy VM migration methods to minimize the end-to-end delay between proxy VMs and their IoT devices and to minimize the total on-grid energy consumption of the cloudlets, respectively. Performance of the proposed methods is validated via extensive simulations.

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  • Akira MISAWA, Masaru KATAYAMA
    Article type: INVITED PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 620-627
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    IoT (Internet of Things) services are emerging and the bandwidth requirements for rich media communication services are increasing exponentially. We propose a virtual edge architecture comprising computation resource management layers and path bandwidth management layers for easy addition and reallocation of new service node functions. These functions are performed by the Virtualized Network Function (VNF), which accommodates terminals covering a corresponding access node to realize fast VNF migration. To increase network size for IoT traffic, VNF migration is limited to the VNF that contains the active terminals, which leads to a 20% reduction in the computation of VNF migration. Fast dynamic bandwidth allocation for dynamic bandwidth paths is realized by proposed Hierarchical Time Slot Allocation of Optical Layer 2 Switch Network, which attain the minimum calculation time of less than 1/100.

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  • Huan-Bang LI, Ryu MIURA, Fumihide KOJIMA
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 628-636
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    Device-to-device (D2D) networks are expected to play a number of roles, such as increasing frequency spectrum efficiency and improving throughput at hot-spots. In this paper, our interest is on the potential of D2D on reducing delivery latency. To enable fast D2D network forming, quick device discovery is essential. For quickening device discovery, we propose a method of defining and using common channel and group channels so as to avoid the channel scan uncertainty faced by the conventional method. Rules for using the common channel and group channels are designed. We evaluate and compare the discovery performance of the proposed method with conventional method by using the superframe structure defined in IEEE 802.15.8 and a general discovery procedure. IEEE 802.15.8 is a standard under development for fully distributed D2D communications. A Netlogo simulator is used to perform step by step MAC simulations. The simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.

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  • Kazuki TANABE, Hiroki NAKAYAMA, Tsunemasa HAYASHI, Katsunori YAMAOKA
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 637-647
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    The 5G mobile network environment has been studied and developed, and the concept of a vEPC (Virtualized Evolved Packet Core) has been introduced as a framework for Network Functions Virtualization (NFV). Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communications in 5G networks require much faster response than are possible in 4G networks. However, if both the control plane (C-plane) and the data plane (D-plane) functions of the EPC are migrated into a single vEPC server, M2M devices and other user equipments (UEs) share the same resources. To accommodate delay-sensitive M2M sessions in vEPC networks, not only signaling performance on the C-plane but also packet processing performance on the D-plane must be optimized. In this paper, we propose a method for optimizing resource assignment of C-plane and D-plane Virtualized Network Functions (VNFs) in a vEPC server, called the vEPC-ORA method. We distinguish the communications of M2M devices and smartphones and model the vEPC server by using queueing theory. Numerical analysis of optimal resource assignment shows that our proposed method minimizes the blocking rates of M2M sessions and smartphone sessions. We also confirmed that the mean packet processing time is kept within the allowable delay for each communication type, as long as the vEPC server has enough VM resources. Moreover, we study a resource granularity effect on the optimal resource assignment. Numerical analysis under a fixed number of hardware resources of MME and S/P-GW is done for various resource granularities of the vEPC server. The evaluation results of numerical analyses showed that the vEPC-ORA method derives the optimal resource assignment in practical calculation times.

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  • Pranesh STHAPIT, Jae-Young PYUN
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 648-656
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    IEEE 802.11ah is a new wireless standard for large-scale wireless connectivity in IoT and M2M applications. One of the major requirements placed on IEEE 802.11ah is the energy-efficient communication of several thousand stations with a single access point. This is especially difficult to achieve during network initialization, because the several thousand stations must rely on the rudimentary approach of random channel access, and the inevitable increase in channel access contention yields a long association delay. IEEE 802.11ah has introduced an authentication control mechanism that classifies stations into groups, and only a small number of stations in a group are allowed to access the medium at a time. Although the grouping strategy provides fair channel access to a large number of stations, the presence of several thousand stations and limitation that only a group can use the channel at a time, causes the association time to remain excessive. In this paper, we propose a novel block association method that enables simultaneous association of all groups. Our experiments verify that our block association method decreases the total association time by many folds.

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  • Cheng ZHANG, Bo GU, Zhi LIU, Kyoko YAMORI, Yoshiaki TANAKA
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 657-666
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    With the rapid increase in demand for mobile data, mobile network operators are trying to expand wireless network capacity by deploying wireless local area network (LAN) hotspots on which they can offload their mobile traffic. However, these network-centric methods usually do not fulfill the interests of mobile users (MUs). Taking into consideration many issues, MUs should be able to decide whether to offload their traffic to a complementary wireless LAN. Our previous work studied single-flow wireless LAN offloading from a MU’s perspective by considering delay-tolerance of traffic, monetary cost and energy consumption. In this paper, we study the multi-flow mobile data offloading problem from a MU’s perspective in which a MU has multiple applications to download data simultaneously from remote servers, and different applications’ data have different deadlines. We formulate the wireless LAN offloading problem as a finite-horizon discrete-time Markov decision process (MDP) and establish an optimal policy by a dynamic programming based algorithm. Since the time complexity of the dynamic programming based offloading algorithm is still high, we propose a low time complexity heuristic offloading algorithm with performance sacrifice. Extensive simulations are conducted to validate our proposed offloading algorithms.

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  • Abu Hena Al MUKTADIR, Ved P. KAFLE, Pedro MARTINEZ-JULIA, Hiroaki HARA ...
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 667-678
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    Network virtualization and slicing technologies create opportunity for infrastructure-less virtual network operators (VNOs) to enter the market anytime and provide diverse services. Multiple VNOs compete to provide the same kinds of services to end users (EUs). VNOs lease virtual resources from the infrastructure provider (InP) and sell services to the EUs by using the leased resources. The difference between the selling and leasing is the gross profit for the VNOs. A VNO that leases resources without precise knowledge of future demand, may not consume all the leased resources through service offers to EUs. Consequently, the VNO experiences loss and resources remain unused. In order to improve resource utilization and ensure that new entrant VNOs do not face losses, proper estimation of initial resource demand is important. In this paper, we propose a Bayesian game with Cournot oligopoly model to properly estimate the optimal initial resource demands for multiple entrant competing VNOs (players) with the objective of maximizing the expected profit for each VNO. The VNOs offer the same kinds of services to EUs with different qualities (player's type), which are public information. The exact service quality with which a VNO competes in the market is private information. Therefore, a VNO assumes the type of its opponent VNOs with certain probability. We derive the Bayesian Nash equilibrium (BNE) of the presented game and evaluate numerically the effect of service qualities and prices on the expected profit and market share of the VNOs.

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  • Yusuke ITO, Hiroyuki KOGA, Katsuyoshi IIDA
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 679-687
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    Cloud computing, which enables users to enjoy various Internet services provided by data centers (DCs) at anytime and anywhere, has attracted much attention. In cloud computing, however, service quality degrades with user distance from the DC, which is unfair. In this study, we propose a bandwidth allocation scheme based on collectable information to improve fairness and link utilization in DC networks. We have confirmed the effectiveness of this approach through simulation evaluations.

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  • Kenji KANAI, Keigo OGAWA, Masaru TAKEUCHI, Jiro KATTO, Toshitaka TSUDA
    Article type: PAPER
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 688-697
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    To reduce the backbone video traffic generated by video surveillance, we propose an intelligent video surveillance system that offers multi-modal sensor-based event detection and event-driven video rate adaptation. Our proposed system can detect pedestrian existence and movements in the monitoring area by using multi-modal sensors (camera, laser scanner and infrared distance sensor) and control surveillance video quality according to the detected events. We evaluate event detection accuracy and video traffic volume in the experiment scenarios where up to six pedestrians pass through and/or stop at the monitoring area. Evaluation results conclude that our system can significantly reduce video traffic while ensuring high-quality surveillance.

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Regular Section
  • Chao SUN, Ling YANG, Juan DU, Fenggang SUN, Li CHEN, Haipeng XI, Sheng ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Fundamental Theories for Communications
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 698-708
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 28, 2017
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    In this paper, we first propose two batch blind source separation and equalization algorithms based on support vector regression (SVR) for linear time-invariant multiple input multiple output (MIMO) systems. The proposed algorithms combine the conventional cost function of SVR with error functions of classical on-line algorithm for blind equalization: both error functions of constant modulus algorithm (CMA) and radius directed algorithm (RDA) are contained in the penalty term of SVR. To recover all sources simultaneously, the cross-correlations of equalizer outputs are included in the cost functions. Simulation experiments show that the proposed algorithms can recover all sources successfully and compensate channel distortion simultaneously. With the use of iterative re-weighted least square (IRWLS) solution of SVR, the proposed algorithms exhibit low computational complexity. Compared with traditional algorithms, the new algorithms only require fewer samples to achieve convergence and perform a lower residual interference. For multilevel signals, the single algorithms based on constant modulus property usually show a relatively high residual error, then we propose two dual-mode blind source separation and equalization schemes. Between them, the dual-mode scheme based on SVR merely requires fewer samples to achieve convergence and further reduces the residual interference.

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  • Xuegang WU, Xiaoping ZENG, Bin FANG
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Fundamental Theories for Communications
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 709-722
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 29, 2017
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    Clustering is known to be an effective means of reducing energy dissipation and prolonging network lifetime in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Recently, game theory has been used to search for optimal solutions to clustering problems. The residual energy of each node is vital to balance a WSN, but was not used in the previous game-theory-based studies when calculating the final probability of being a cluster head. Furthermore, the node payoffs have also not been expressed in terms of energy consumption. To address these issues, the final probability of being a cluster head is determined by both the equilibrium probability in a game and a node residual energy-dependent exponential function. In the process of computing the equilibrium probability, new payoff definitions related to energy consumption are adopted. In order to further reduce the energy consumption, an assistant method is proposed, in which the candidate nodes with the most residual energy in the close point pairs completely covered by other neighboring sensors are firstly selected and then transmit same sensing data to the corresponding cluster heads. In this paper, we propose an efficient energy-aware clustering protocol based on game theory for WSNs. Although only game-based method can perform well in this paper, the protocol of the cooperation with both two methods exceeds previous by a big margin in terms of network lifetime in a series of experiments.

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  • Bilal MASOOD, Waheed Aftab KHAN, Manzoor ELLAHI, Talha ARSHAD, Muhamma ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Energy in Electronics Communications
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 723-730
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 04, 2017
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    This paper proposes a technique for broadcasting control of Smart Air Conditioners (SACs) by implementing the Narrowband Powerline Communications (NB-PLC) technology. The Master Control Room (MCR) generates commands for SACs operation that are sent over power lines by using the communication protocol known as Smart Energy Profile 1.0 (SEP 1.0). The proposed system can also offers features like Demand Response (DR) to facilitate the Smart Grid (SG). Field measurements elucidate the performance of NB-PLC systems. Measurements are carried out by injecting and receiving the NB-PLC signal over low voltage (LV) power lines, medium voltage (MV) power lines and across transformers. A hybrid communication system, NB-PLC integrated with Optical Fiber Network (OFN), is developed for the automation of Distribution System (DS) of Lahore Electric Supply Company (LESCO). The developed system was tested for the DR program in order to support the Smart Air Conditioning system within Lahore. It is suggested that by adjusting the commercial SACs parameters, the task of energy conservation can be achieved by optimizing the peak load curves for greater efficiency. Moreover, data of various types of appliances can also be communicated to the MCR for the purpose of demand side management.

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  • Takayoshi AOKI, Keita MATSUGI, Yukitoshi SANADA
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Transmission Systems and Transmission Equipment for Communications
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 731-739
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    This paper presents an approximated log-likelihood ratio calculation scheme with bit shifts and summations. Our previous work yielded a metric calculation scheme that replaces multiplications with bit shifts and summations in the selection of candidate signal points for joint maximum likelihood detection (MLD). Log-likelihood ratio calculation for turbo decoding generally uses multiplications and by replacing them with bit shifts and summations it is possible to reduce the numbers of logic operations under specific transmission parameters. In this paper, an approximated log-likelihood ratio calculation scheme that substitutes bit shifts and summations for multiplications is proposed. In the proposed scheme, additions are used only for higher-order bits. Numerical results obtained through computer simulation show that this scheme can eliminate multiplications in turbo decoding at the cost of just 0.2dB performance degradation at a BER of 10-4.

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  • Nagao OGINO, Takeshi KITAHARA
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 740-749
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 14, 2017
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    Peer-to-peer overlay networks can easily achieve a large-scale content sharing system on the Internet. Although unstructured peer-to-peer networks are suitable for finding entire partial-match content, flooding-based search is an inefficient way to obtain target content. When the shared content is semantically specified by a great number of attributes, it is difficult to derive the semantic similarity of peers beforehand. This means that content search methods relying on interest-based locality are more advantageous than those based on the semantic similarity of peers. Existing search methods that exploit interest-based locality organize multiple peer groups, in each of which peers with common interests are densely connected using short-cut links. However, content searches among multiple peer groups are still inefficient when the number of incident links at each peer is limited due to the capacity of the peer. This paper proposes a novel content search method that exploits interest-based locality. The proposed method can organize an efficient peer-to-peer network similar to the semantic small-world random graph, which can be organized by the existing methods based on the semantic similarity of peers. In the proposed method, topology transformation based on local link replacement maintains the numbers of incident links at all the peers. Simulation results confirm that the proposed method can achieve a significantly higher ratio of obtainable partial-match content than existing methods that organize peer groups.

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  • Alberto GALLEGOS, Taku NOGUCHI, Tomoko IZUMI, Yoshio NAKATANI
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 750-762
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 28, 2017
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    In this paper we propose the Zone-based Energy Aware data coLlection (ZEAL) protocol. ZEAL is designed to be used in agricultural applications for wireless sensor networks. In these type of applications, all data is often routed to a single point (named “sink” in sensor networks). The overuse of the same routes quickly depletes the energy of the nodes closer to the sink. In order to minimize this problem, ZEAL automatically creates zones (groups of nodes) independent from each other based on the trajectory of one or more mobile sinks. In this approach the sinks collects data queued in sub-sinks in each zone. Unlike existing protocols, ZEAL accomplish its routing tasks without using GPS modules for location awareness or synchronization mechanisms. Additionally, ZEAL provides an energy saving mechanism on the network layer that puts zones to sleep when there are no mobile sinks nearby. To evaluate ZEAL, it is compared with the Maximum Amount Shortest Path (MASP) protocol. Our simulations using the ns-3 network simulator show that ZEAL is able to collect a larger number of packets with significantly less energy in the same amount of time.

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  • Kazuhiko KINOSHITA, Masahiko AIHARA, Shiori KONO, Nariyoshi YAMAI, Tak ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 763-771
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 04, 2017
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    In recent years, the number of requests to transfer large files via large high-speed computer networks has been increasing rapidly. Typically, these requests are handled in the “best effort” manner which results in unpredictable completion times. In this paper, we consider a model where a transfer request either must be completed by a user-specified deadline or must be rejected if its deadline cannot be satisfied. We propose a bandwidth scheduling method and a routing method for reducing the call-blocking probability in a bandwidth-guaranteed network. Finally, we show their excellent performance by simulation experiments.

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  • Bimal CHANDRA DAS, Satoshi TAKAHASHI, Eiji OKI, Masakazu MURAMATSU
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 772-784
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 14, 2017
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    This paper introduces robust optimization models for minimization of the network congestion ratio that can handle the fluctuation in traffic demands between nodes. The simplest and widely used model to minimize the congestion ratio, called the pipe model, is based on precisely specified traffic demands. However, in practice, network operators are often unable to estimate exact traffic demands as they can fluctuate due to unpredictable factors. To overcome this weakness, we apply robust optimization to the problem of minimizing the network congestion ratio. First, we review existing models as robust counterparts of certain uncertainty sets. Then we consider robust optimization assuming ellipsoidal uncertainty sets, and derive a tractable optimization problem in the form of second-order cone programming (SOCP). Furthermore, we take uncertainty sets to be the intersection of ellipsoid and polyhedral sets, and considering the mirror subproblems inherent in the models, obtain tractable optimization problems, again in SOCP form. Compared to the previous model that assumes an error interval on each coordinate, our models have the advantage of being able to cope with the total amount of errors by setting a parameter that determines the volume of the ellipsoid. We perform numerical experiments to compare our SOCP models with the existing models which are formulated as linear programming problems. The results demonstrate the relevance of our models in terms of congestion ratio and computation time.

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  • Ju-Ho CHOI, Jung-Hwan CHA, Youn-Hee HAN, Sung-Gi MIN
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 785-794
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 24, 2017
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    The integration of VANETs with Internet is required if vehicles are to access IP-based applications. A vehicle must have an IP address, and the IP mobility service should be supported during the movement of the vehicle. VANET standards such as WAVE or C-ITS use IPv6 address auto configuration to allocate an IP address to a vehicle. In C-ITS, NEMO-BS is used to support IP mobility. The vehicle moves rapidly, so reallocation of IP address as well as binding update occurs frequently. The vehicle' communication, however, may be disrupted for a considerable amount of time, and the packet loss occurs during these events. Also, the finding of the home address of the peer vehicle is not a trivial matter. We propose a network based identifier locator separation scheme for VANETs. The scheme uses a vehicle identity based address generation scheme. It eliminates the frequent address reallocation and simplifies the finding of the peer vehicle IP address. In the scheme, a network entity tracks the vehicles in its coverage and the vehicles share the IP address of the network entity for their locators. The network entity manages the mapping between the vehicle's identifier and its IP address. The scheme excludes the vehicles from the mobility procedure, so a vehicle needs only the standard IPv6 protocol stack, and mobility signaling does not occur on the wireless link. The scheme also supports seamlessness, so packet loss is mitigated. The results of a simulation show that the vehicles experience seamless packet delivery.

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  • Takuya KOSUGIYAMA, Kazuki TANABE, Hiroki NAKAYAMA, Tsunemasa HAYASHI, ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 795-804
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 14, 2017
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    Software-Defined Networking (SDN) can be applied for managing application flows dynamically by a logically centralized SDN controller and SDN switches. Because one SDN switch can support just a few thousand forwarding rule installations per second, it is a barrier to dynamic and scalable application flow management. For this reason, it is essential to reduce the number of application flows if they are to be successfully managed. Nowadays, since much attention has been paid to developing a network service that reduces application delay, the allowable delay of application flows has become an important factor. However, there has been no work on minimizing the number of flows while satisfying end-to-end delay of flows. In this paper, we propose a method that can aggregate flows and minimize the number flows in a network while ensuring all flows satisfy their allowable delay in accordance with QoS or SLA. Since the problem is classified as NP-hard, we propose a heuristic algorithm. We compared the aggregation effect of the proposed method, simple aggregation method and optimal solution by simulation. In addition, we clarify the characteristics of the proposed method by performing simulations with various parameter settings. The results show that the proposed method decreases the number of rules than comparative aggregation method and has very shorter computational time than optimal solution.

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  • Shohei KAMAMURA, Aki FUKUDA, Rie HAYASHI, Yoshihiko UEMATSU
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 805-815
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 28, 2017
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    This paper proposes a regulated transport network design algorithm for IP over a dense wavelength division multiplex (DWDM) network. When designing an IP over DWDM network, the network operator should consider not only cost-effectiveness and physical constraints such as wavelength colors and chromatic dispersion but also operational policies such as resilience, quality, stability, and operability. For considering the above polices, we propose to separate the network design algorithm based on a geographical resolution; the policy-based regulated intra-area is designed based on this resolution, and the cost-optimal inter-area is then designed separately, and finally merged. This approach does not necessarily yield a strict optimal solution, but it covers network design work done by humans, which takes a vast amount of time and requires a high skill level. For efficient geographical resolution, we also present fast graph mining algorithm, which can solve NP-hard subgraph isomorphism problem within the practical time. We prove the sufficiency of the resulting network design for the above polices by visualizing the topology, and also prove that the penalty of applying the approach is trivial.

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  • Xi CHEN, Tao WU, Lei XIE
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 816-824
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 29, 2017
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    The centralized controller of SDN enables a global topology view of the underlying network. It is possible for the SDN controller to achieve globally optimized resource composition and utilization, including optimized end-to-end paths. Currently, resource composition in SDN arena is usually conducted in an imperative manner where composition logics are explicitly specified in high level programming languages. It requires strong programming and OpenFlow backgrounds. This paper proposes declarative path composition, namely Compass, which offers a human-friendly user interface similar to natural language. Borrowing methodologies from Semantic Web, Compass models and stores SDN resources using OWL and RDF, respectively, to foster the virtualized and unified management of the network resources regardless of the concrete controller platform. Besides, path composition is conducted in a declarative manner where the user merely specifies the composition goal in the SPARQL query language instead of explicitly specifying concrete composition details in programming languages. Composed paths are also reused based on similarity matching, to reduce the chance of time-consuming path composition. The experiment results reflect the applicability of Compass in path composition and reuse.

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  • Wei HAN, Baosheng WANG, Zhenqian FENG, Baokang ZHAO, Wanrong YU, Zhu T ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Network Management/Operation
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 825-834
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 24, 2017
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    Comparing with that of terrestrial networks, the location management in satellite networks is mainly restricted by three factors, i.e., the limited on-board processing (OBP), insufficient link resources and long propagation delay. Under these restrictions, the limited OBP can be smoothened by terrestrial gateway-based location management, the constraint from link resources demands the bandwidth-efficient management scheme and long propagation delay potentially lowers the management efficiency. Currently, the reduction of the management cost has always been the main direction in existing work which is based on the centralized management architecture. This centralized management has many defects, such as the non-optimal routing, scalability problem and single point of failure. To address these problems, this paper explores gateway-based distributed location management schemes for Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite networks. Three management schemes based on terrestrial gateways are proposed and analyzed: loose location management, precise location management, and the grouping location management. The analyses specifically analyze the cost of location queries and show their significant influence on the total cost which includes the location management and query. Starting from the above analysis, we speculate and prove the existence of the optimum scheme in grouping location management, which has the lowest total cost for the query frequency within given range. Simulation results validate the theoretical analysis on the cost and show the feature of latency in location queries, which provide a valuable insight into the design of the distributed location management scheme in satellite networks.

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  • Asif AWALUDIN, Josaphat TETUKO SRI SUMANTYO, Koichi ITO, Steven GAO, A ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Antennas and Propagation
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 835-846
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 11, 2017
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    Two wideband circularly polarized (CP) equilateral triangular slot (ETS) antennas are proposed for communication system and the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Radio Occultation (RO) sensor of the GAIA-I microsatellite. These wide slot antennas use the ring slot antenna CP generation method due to their shape. The compact antennas employ truncated corners, grounded equilateral triangular perturbation patch and branched feed line to create CP radiation. A 3-dB axial ratio bandwidth (ARBW) enhancement is achieved by inserting a pair of slits into the ETS. A parametric study on the influence of those shape modifications in reflection coefficient and axial ratio is presented. An ETS antenna for communication system of the GAIA-I is fabricated and measured, which is shown to agree well with its simulated performance by providing CP fractional bandwidth of 52%. An ETS antenna designed for the GNSS RO sensor of GAIA-I delivers 3-dB ARBW of 41.6%. The ETS antenna offers uni-directional radiation by mounting a 3D printed truncated cone reflector underneath which also enhances antenna gain.

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  • Tao XIE, Jiang ZHU, Jinjun LUO
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Antennas and Propagation
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 847-855
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 28, 2017
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    The rotating element electric field vector (REV) method is a classical measurement technique for phased array calibration. Compared with other calibration methods, it requires only power measurements. Thus, the REV method is more reliable for operating phased array calibration systems. However, since the phase of each element must be rotated from 0 to 2π, the conventional REV method requires a large number of measurements. Moreover, the power of composite electric field vector doesn't vary significantly because only a single element's phase is rotated. Thus, it can be easily degraded by the receiver noise. A simplified REV method combined with Hadamard group division is proposed in this paper. In the proposed method, only power measurements are required. All the array elements are divided into different groups according to the group matrix derived from the normalized Hadamard matrix. The phases of all the elements in the same group are rotated at the same time, and the composite electric field vector of this group is obtained by the simplified REV method. Hence, the relative electric fields of all elements can be obtained by a matrix equation. Compared with the conventional REV method, the proposed method can not only reduce the number of measurements but also improve the measurement accuracy under the particular range of signal to noise ratio(SNR) at the receiver, especially under low and moderate SNRs.

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  • Moeko YOSHIDA, Hiromichi NASHIMOTO, Teruyuki MIYAJIMA
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 856-864
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 24, 2017
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    This paper proposes a partial transmit sequences (PTS)-based PAPR reduction method and a phase factor estimation method without side information for OFDM systems with QPSK and 16QAM modulation. In the transmitter, an iterative algorithm that minimizes the p-norm of a transmitted signal determines phase factors to reduce PAPR. Unlike conventional methods, the phase factors are allowed to take continuous values in a limited range. In the receiver, the phase factor is blindly estimated by evaluating the phase differences between the equalizer's output and its closest constellation points. Simulation results show that the proposed PAPR reduction method is more computationally efficient than the conventional PTS. Moreover, the combined use of the two proposed methods achieves a satisfactory tradeoff between PAPR and BER by limiting the phase factors properly.

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  • Zhiwei MAO, Xianmin WANG
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 865-876
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 14, 2017
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    Cognitive radio (CR) is considered as the most promising solution to the so-called spectrum scarcity problem, in which channel sensing is an important problem. In this paper, the problem of determining the period of medium access control (MAC)-layer channel sensing in cognitive radio networks (CRNs) is studied. In our study, the channel state is statistically modeled as a continuous-time alternating renewal process (ARP) alternating between the OFF and ON states for the primary user (PU)'s communication activity. Based on the statistical ARP model, we analyze the CRNs with different SU MAC protocols, taking into consideration the effects of practical issues of imperfect channel sensing and non-negligible channel sensing time. Based on the analysis results, a constrained optimization problem to find the optimal sensing period is formulated and the feasibility of this problem is studied for systems with different OFF/ON channel state length distributions. Numerical results are presented to show the performance of the proposed sensing period optimization scheme. The effects of practical system parameters, including channel sensing errors and channel sensing time, on the performance and the computational complexity of the proposed sensing period optimization scheme are also investigated.

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  • Tatsuhiko IWAKUNI, Kazuki MARUTA, Atsushi OHTA, Yushi SHIRATO, Masatak ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 877-884
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 28, 2017
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    This paper presents experimental results of our proposed null-space expansion scheme for multiuser massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) in time varying channels. Multiuser MIMO transmission with the proposed scheme can suppress the inter-user interference (IUI) caused by outdated channel state information (CSI). The excess degrees of freedom (DoFs) of massive MIMO is exploited to perform additional null-steering using past estimated CSI. The signal-to-interference power ratio (SIR) and spectral efficiency performances achieved by the proposed scheme that uses measured CSI is experimentally evaluated. It is confirmed that the proposed scheme shows performance superior to the conventional channel prediction scheme. In addition, IUI can be stably suppressed even in high mobility environments by further increasing the null-space dimension.

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  • Mitsukuni KONISHI, Sho NABATAME, Daigo OGATA, Atsushi NAGATE, Teruya F ...
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 885-896
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 11, 2017
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    Network-listening-based synchronization is recently attracting attention as an effective timing synchronization method for indoor small-cell base stations as they cannot utilize GPS-based synchronization. It uses only the macro-cell downlink signal to establish synchronization with the overlaying macro cell. However, the loop-back signal from the small-cell base station itself interferes with the reception of the macro-cell downlink signal in the deployment of co-channel heterogeneous networks. In this paper, we investigate a synchronization method that avoids loop-back interference by muting small-cell data transmission and shifting small-cell transmission timing. Our proposal enables to reduce the processing burden of the network listening and mitigate the throughput degradation of the small cell caused by the data-transmission mutation. In addition to this, the network-listening system enables the network listening in dense small cell deployments where a large number of neighboring small cells exist. We clarify the performance of our proposal by computer simulations and laboratory experiments on actual equipment.

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  • Hirofumi TSUDA, Ken UMENO
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 897-908
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 11, 2017
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    This paper shows an optimal spreading sequence in the Weyl sequence class, which is similar to the set of the Oppermann sequences for asynchronous CDMA systems. Sequences in Weyl sequence class have the desired property that the order of cross-correlation is low. Therefore, sequences in the Weyl sequence class are expected to minimize the inter-symbol interference. We evaluate the upper bound of cross-correlation and odd cross-correlation of spreading sequences in the Weyl sequence class and construct the optimization problem: minimize the upper bound of the absolute values of cross-correlation and odd cross-correlation. Since our optimization problem is convex, we can derive the optimal spreading sequences as the global solution of the problem. We show their signal to interference plus noise ratio (SINR) in a special case. From this result, we propose how the initial elements are assigned, that is, how spreading sequences are assigned to each users. In an asynchronous CDMA system, we also numerically compare our spreading sequences with other ones, the Gold codes, the Oppermann sequences, the optimal Chebyshev spreading sequences and the SP sequences in Bit Error Rate. Our spreading sequence, which yields the global solution, has the highest performance among the other spreading sequences tested.

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  • Sangjoon PARK
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Wireless Communication Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 909-914
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 19, 2017
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    This paper proposes a sequentially iterative equalizer based on Kalman filtering and smoothing (SIEKFS) for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems under frequency selective fading channels. In the proposed SIEKFS, an iteration consists of sequentially executed subiterations, and each subiteration performs equalization and detection procedures of the symbols transmitted from a specific transmit antenna. During this subiteration, all available observations for the transmission block are utilized in the equalization procedures. Furthermore, the entire soft estimate of the desired symbols to be detected does not participate in the equalization procedures of the desired symbols, i.e., the proposed SIEKFS performs input-by-input equalization procedures for a priori information nulling. Therefore, compared with the original iterative equalizer based on Kalman filtering and smoothing, which performs symbol-by-symbol equalization procedures, the proposed SIEKFS can also perform iterative equalization based on the Kalman framework and turbo principle, with a significant reduction in computation complexity. Simulation results verify that the proposed SIEKFS achieves suboptimum error performance as the size of the antenna configuration and the number of iterations increase.

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  • Shusuke NARIEDA
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Terrestrial Wireless Communication/Broadcasting Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 915-923
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 29, 2017
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    This paper presents a computationally efficient cyclostationarity detection based spectrum sensing technique in cognitive radio. Traditionally, several cyclostationarity detection based spectrum sensing techniques with a low computational complexity have been presented, e.g., peak detector (PD), maximum cyclic autocorrelation selection (MCAS), and so on. PD can be affected by noise uncertainty because it requires a noise floor estimation, whereas MCAS does not require the estimation. Furthermore, the computational complexity of MCAS is greater than that of PD because MCAS must compute some statistics for signal detection instead of the estimation unnecessary whereas PD must compute only one statistic. In the presented MCAS based techniques, only one statistic must be computed. The presented technique obtains other necessary statistics from the procedure that computes the statistic. Therefore, the computational complexity of the presented is almost the same as that of PD, and it does not require the noise floor estimation for threshold. Numerical examples are shown to validate the effectiveness of the presented technique.

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  • Toshihisa NABETANI, Narendar MADHAVAN, Hiroki MORI, Tsuguhide AOKI
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Terrestrial Wireless Communication/Broadcasting Technologies
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 924-932
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: September 15, 2017
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    The next generation wireless LAN standard IEEE 802.11ax aims to provide improved throughput performance in dense environments. We have proposed an efficient channel sounding mechanism for DL-MU-MIMO that has been adopted as a new sounding protocol in the 802.11ax standard. In this paper, we evaluate the overhead reduction in the 802.11ax sounding protocol compared with the 802.11ac sounding protocol. Sounding is frequently performed to obtain accurate channel information from the associated stations in order to improve overall system throughput. However, there is a trade-off between accurate channel information and the overhead incurred due to frequent sounding. Therefore, the sounding interval is an important factor that determines system throughput in DL-MU-MIMO transmission. We also evaluate the effect of sounding interval on the system throughput performance using both sounding protocols and provide a comparative analysis of the performance improvement.

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  • Kimiko KAWASHIMA, Kazuhisa YAMAGISHI, Takanori HAYASHI
    Article type: PAPER
    Subject area: Multimedia Systems for Communications
    2018 Volume E101.B Issue 3 Pages 933-945
    Published: March 01, 2018
    Released on J-STAGE: March 01, 2018
    Advance online publication: August 29, 2017
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    Many subjective quality assessment methods have been standardized. Experimenters can select a method from these methods in accordance with the aim of the planned subjective assessment experiment. It is often argued that the results of subjective quality assessment are affected by range effects that are caused by the quality distribution of the assessment videos. However, there are no studies on the double stimulus continuous quality-scale (DSCQS) and absolute category rating with hidden reference (ACR-HR) methods that investigate range effects in the high-quality range. Therefore, we conduct experiments using high-quality assessment videos (high-quality experiment) and low-to-high-quality assessment videos (low-to-high-quality experiment) and compare the DSCQS and ACR-HR methods in terms of accuracy, stability, and discrimination ability. Regarding accuracy, we find that the mean opinion scores of the DSCQS and ACR-HR methods were marginally affected by range effects, although almost all common processed video sequences showed no significant difference for the high- and low-to-high-quality experiments. Second, the DSCQS and ACR-HR methods were equally stable in the low-to-high-quality experiment, whereas the DSCQS method was more stable than the ACR-HR method in the high-quality experiment. Finally, the DSCQS method had higher discrimination ability than the ACR-HR method in the low-to-high-quality experiment, whereas both methods had almost the same discrimination ability for the high-quality experiment. We thus determined that the DSCQS method is better at minimizing the range effects than the ACR-HR method in the high-quality range.

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