Towards the Standardization of Non-orthogonal Multiple Access for Next Generation Wireless Networks

TL;DR

This paper reviews the development and standardization of non-orthogonal multiple access (NoMA) as a promising technology for future wireless networks, highlighting its advantages over traditional orthogonal schemes.

Contribution

It provides a systematic overview of NoMA transmission design, standardization efforts, and potential use cases for next-generation cellular networks.

Findings

NoMA offers significant improvements in system capacity and user connectivity.

Standardization efforts are progressing to incorporate NoMA into future wireless standards.

Potential use cases include enhanced 5G and beyond cellular networks.

Abstract

Non-orthogonal multiple access (NoMA) as an efficient way of radio resource sharing can root back to the network information theory. For generations of wireless communication systems design, orthogonal multiple access (OMA) schemes in time, frequency, or code domain have been the main choices due to the limited processing capability in the transceiver hardware, as well as the modest traffic demands in both latency and connectivity. However, for the next generation radio systems, given its vision to connect everything and the much evolved hardware capability, NoMA has been identified as a promising technology to help achieve all the targets in system capacity, user connectivity, and service latency. This article will provide a systematic overview of the state-of-the-art design of the NoMA transmission based on a unified transceiver design framework, the related standardization progress, and some promising use cases in future cellular networks, based on which the interested researchers can get a quick start in this area.