Publicação
Industrial communications system optimization based on 5G
| Resumo: | The industry is undergoing the fourth industrial revolution, which provides ubiquitous connectivity among industrial assets, increasing synchronization, process efficiency, and productivity. Technologies like 5G are crucial for this transformation due to their flexibility. This revolution involves deploying numerous use cases with heterogeneous and demanding requirements that the underlying communication infrastructure must consistently meet. 5G network slicing will be key in adjusting network performance based on industrial requirements. However, no existing mechanisms can deploy and configure custom network slices tailored to industrial needs across all 5G networks. Moreover, for full industrial adoption of network technology, the network must be completely controlled by simple interfaces that non-experts in the technology can use to control and adjust the entire network according to industrial requirements. Since current 5G management systems are complex and require specific expertise, this thesis work focuses on simplifying the creation and management of 5G slices. The research examined how 5G can be applied to enhance industrial operations. Then, it assesses baseline performance and network configurations, where limited support is revealed in slice creation and deployment. Subsequent work focuses on understanding 5G mechanisms and how to adapt them to adjust network performance according to network slice requirements. These mechanisms were then validated on the factory shop floor, with groundbreaking contributions to both national and European projects. The acquired knowledge about 5G mechanisms was then leveraged to map the communication attributes of a network slice to the available 5G functionalities, paving the way for a fully-fledged network slice manager system. The culmination of this research was designing a network slice manager capable of deploying and managing custom network slices tailored to the requirements of industrial use cases. Based on this design, a network slice manager prototype was developed to validate its capabilities. The prototype demonstrated its ability to deploy and manage fully customized network slices and enable dynamic slicing in a commercial 5G network. It can provide slices that preserve the technology readiness level (TRL) of the underlying 5G infrastructure, making them suitable for industrial use and showcasing the potential of a future commercial network slice manager. In addition to the main thesis work, the PhD involved the management and operation of the 5GAIner network while configuring it based on Altice, Huawei, and Portugal regulation requirements and collaborating on various national and international projects, leveraging the knowledge gained and the network slice manager prototype to design and deploy industrial use cases. Several of these use cases required network performance adjustments to be deployed, demonstrating the importance of the contributions. These projects influenced the main work by presenting industrial challenges, demands, and concerns, shaping the development of the solution to be similar to what is expected of a commercial industrial network slice manager. |
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| Autores principais: | Perdigão, André David Távora |
| Assunto: | Private 5G networks Testbeds Quality of service (QoS) Network slicing Industry 4.0 Internet of things (IoT) Industrial IoT (IIoT) |
| Ano: | 2025 |
| País: | Portugal |
| Tipo de documento: | tese de doutoramento |
| Tipo de acesso: | acesso aberto |
| Instituição associada: | Universidade de Aveiro |
| Idioma: | inglês |
| Origem: | RIA - Repositório Institucional da Universidade de Aveiro |
| Resumo: | The industry is undergoing the fourth industrial revolution, which provides ubiquitous connectivity among industrial assets, increasing synchronization, process efficiency, and productivity. Technologies like 5G are crucial for this transformation due to their flexibility. This revolution involves deploying numerous use cases with heterogeneous and demanding requirements that the underlying communication infrastructure must consistently meet. 5G network slicing will be key in adjusting network performance based on industrial requirements. However, no existing mechanisms can deploy and configure custom network slices tailored to industrial needs across all 5G networks. Moreover, for full industrial adoption of network technology, the network must be completely controlled by simple interfaces that non-experts in the technology can use to control and adjust the entire network according to industrial requirements. Since current 5G management systems are complex and require specific expertise, this thesis work focuses on simplifying the creation and management of 5G slices. The research examined how 5G can be applied to enhance industrial operations. Then, it assesses baseline performance and network configurations, where limited support is revealed in slice creation and deployment. Subsequent work focuses on understanding 5G mechanisms and how to adapt them to adjust network performance according to network slice requirements. These mechanisms were then validated on the factory shop floor, with groundbreaking contributions to both national and European projects. The acquired knowledge about 5G mechanisms was then leveraged to map the communication attributes of a network slice to the available 5G functionalities, paving the way for a fully-fledged network slice manager system. The culmination of this research was designing a network slice manager capable of deploying and managing custom network slices tailored to the requirements of industrial use cases. Based on this design, a network slice manager prototype was developed to validate its capabilities. The prototype demonstrated its ability to deploy and manage fully customized network slices and enable dynamic slicing in a commercial 5G network. It can provide slices that preserve the technology readiness level (TRL) of the underlying 5G infrastructure, making them suitable for industrial use and showcasing the potential of a future commercial network slice manager. In addition to the main thesis work, the PhD involved the management and operation of the 5GAIner network while configuring it based on Altice, Huawei, and Portugal regulation requirements and collaborating on various national and international projects, leveraging the knowledge gained and the network slice manager prototype to design and deploy industrial use cases. Several of these use cases required network performance adjustments to be deployed, demonstrating the importance of the contributions. These projects influenced the main work by presenting industrial challenges, demands, and concerns, shaping the development of the solution to be similar to what is expected of a commercial industrial network slice manager. |
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Atividades financiadas
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