Large Intelligent Surface/Antennas (LISA): Making Reflective Radios Smart

TL;DR

This paper introduces Large Intelligent Surface/Antennas (LISA), a promising technology for programmable wireless environments that uses reflective elements to control electromagnetic waves for enhanced wireless communication.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of LISA technology, including fundamentals, implementations, applications, and discusses future challenges and open issues.

Findings

LISA enables software-defined wireless environments.

LISA can manipulate electromagnetic waves with unnatural properties.

Research on LISA applications is rapidly evolving.

Abstract

Large intelligent surface/antennas (LISA), a two-dimensional artificial structure with a large number of reflective-surface/antenna elements, is a promising reflective radio technology to construct programmable wireless environments in a smart way. Specifically, each element of the LISA adjusts the reflection of the incident electromagnetic waves with unnatural properties, such as negative refraction, perfect absorption, and anomalous reflection, thus the wireless environments can be software-defined according to various design objectives. In this paper, we introduce the reflective radio basics, including backscattering principles, backscatter communication, and reflective relay, and the fundamentals and implementations of LISA technology. Then, we present an overview of the state-of-the-art research on emerging applications of LISA-aided wireless networks. Finally, the limitations, challenges, and open issues associated with LISA for future wireless applications are discussed.