Survey of Spectrum Sharing for Inter-Technology Coexistence

TL;DR

This survey reviews spectrum sharing mechanisms for wireless inter-technology coexistence, analyzing technical and non-technical factors, and identifies future research directions for efficient spectrum utilization.

Contribution

It provides a unified system-level framework for analyzing spectrum sharing, combining technical and regulatory aspects, and offers a comprehensive literature review on inter-technology coexistence.

Findings

Identified key spectrum sharing design parameters across layers.

Reviewed existing solutions for equal spectrum access rights.

Discussed challenges and future research directions.

Abstract

Increasing capacity demands in emerging wireless technologies are expected to be met by network densification and spectrum bands open to multiple technologies. These will, in turn, increase the level of interference and also result in more complex inter-technology interactions, which will need to be managed through spectrum sharing mechanisms. Consequently, novel spectrum sharing mechanisms should be designed to allow spectrum access for multiple technologies, while efficiently utilizing the spectrum resources overall. Importantly, it is not trivial to design such efficient mechanisms, not only due to technical aspects, but also due to regulatory and business model constraints. In this survey we address spectrum sharing mechanisms for wireless inter-technology coexistence by means of a technology circle that incorporates in a unified, system-level view the technical and non-technical aspects. We thus systematically explore the spectrum sharing design space consisting of parameters at different layers. Using this framework, we present a literature review on inter-technology coexistence with a focus on wireless technologies with equal spectrum access rights, i.e. (i) primary/primary, (ii) secondary/secondary, and (iii) technologies operating in a spectrum commons. Moreover, we reflect on our literature review to identify possible spectrum sharing design solutions and performance evaluation approaches useful for future coexistence cases. Finally, we discuss spectrum sharing design challenges and suggest future research directions.