Flexible and Scalable Broadband Massive MIMO Testbed for Joint Communication and Sensing Applications

Abstract:
The development of new mobile communication standards, for example currently the 6th generation (6G) and beyond, requires an extensive evaluation of new waveforms, algorithms, and applications such as joint communication and sensing (JCAS). JCAS benefits from increasing bandwidths, higher carrier frequencies in the millimeter-wave (mmW) range as well as massive multiple-input multiple-output (mMIMO) systems, which allow highly directional beamforming. However, these features also pose major challenges for the hardware and software of the required test systems, since high data rates have to be either stored or processed in real-time and all components must be synchronized in time, frequency and phase to avoid errors in the beamforming or estimation of target parameters in the radar sensing. The German research project Open6GHub is currently developing and building such a highperformance test system that is flexible enough to handle further bandwidth increases, additional frequency bands, and new signal processing methods. This highly-scalable mMIMO testbed can provide a maximum instantaneous signal bandwidth of up to 2 GHz and 256 digital transmit and receive channels. Since the beginning of the concept phase, most components have now been completed and first test measurements have been conducted. They demonstrate the performance and capability of the testbed, that will provide the involved researchers a mmW platform for rapidly testing their algorithms and waveforms.