Non-terrestrial networks (NTNs) traditionally have certain limited applications. However, the recent technological advancements and manufacturing cost reduction opened up myriad applications of NTNs for 5G and beyond networks, especially when integrated into terrestrial networks (TNs). This article comprehensively surveys the evolution of NTNs highlighting their relevance to 5G networks and essentially, how it will play a pivotal role in the development of 6G ecosystem. We discuss important features of NTNs integration into TNs and the synergies by delving into the new range of services and use cases, various architectures, technological enablers, and higher layer aspects pertinent to NTNs integration. Moreover, we review the corresponding challenges arising from the technical peculiarities and the new approaches being adopted to develop efficient integrated ground-air-space (GAS) networks. Our survey further includes the major progress and outcomes from academic research as well as industrial efforts representing the main industrial trends, field trials, and prototyping towards the 6G networks.

This paper investigates the performance of an intelligent reflective surface (IRS) assisted non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) system, where the IRS is mounted on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to assist the transmissions from a base station (BS). The BS utilizes the UAV as a relay to serve multiple user equipments (UEs) on the ground. In addition to the IRS relaying links, we also incorporate direct non line-of-sight links between the BS and UEs. We derive the outage probability for this system configuration. Moreover, we obtain a bound of the ergodic spectral efficiency to extract various useful insights. Furthermore, we also compare the performance of the proposed system design against the baseline scheme. Finally, we present numerical results to highlight the benefits of the proposed IRS-aided UAV relaying system and the accuracy of the derived analytical results.

Terahertz (THz) communication is a promising technique for chip-to-chip communication and wireless personal area networks. In this paper, we present an experimental study and design to realize such THz communication systems. We develop two different chip sets for on-off-keying (OOK) modulation based THz transceivers which include carrier generators, modulators, THz amplifiers, and baseband amplifiers. Specifically, the first chip set integrates the circuit blocks for the OOK modulation without the THz amplifier for short-range communication. In addition, the second chip set design includes the THz amplifier modules to extend the coverage of transmission. For these two chip sets, we experimentally demonstrate the feasibility of the wireless communication at THz frequency bands and assess performance using the bit error rate (BER) analysis. We estimate the BER by calculating the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) based on the eye diagram and compare with actual BER measurements and Monte Carlo simulations. We also address the impact of the distance, the transmit power, and the data rate for the proposed THz transceivers based on the link budget analysis, and confirm the accuracy of the derived BER expression.

In this paper, we investigate the performance of energy harvesting two-way relay systems in the presence of transceiver hardware impairments (HIs). In order to improve the reliability of the communication links, we employ a three-phase hybrid decode-amplify-forward (HDAF) based relaying scheme. In the considered system, the battery-enabled relay node harvests energy from the ambient radio-frequency (RF) signals using a time switching approach. We demonstrate that HIs pose detrimental impact on the performance of system by invoking ceiling effects, primarily when high target rates are anticipated. Consequently, we propose an improved HDAF (IHDAF) relaying scheme which makes the efficient use of available degrees of freedom and thereby enhances the system performance significantly. As such, the IHDAF relaying may induce slightly higher complexity due to involvement of the limited feedback mechanism. However, the benefits offered by this scheme far outweigh its limitation. For the considered system, we derive the user outage probability expressions for both the schemes by applying selection cooperation between direct and relayed links over Nakagami- $m$ fading channels. We also analyze the system throughput and energy efficiency for the two schemes to obtain various useful insights. Finally, numerical and simulation results are provided for the validation of the derived analytical expressions.

In this paper, we investigate the performance of a piece-wise linear model of energy harvesting-based multiuser overlay spectrum sharing system. Herein, an energy-constrained secondary node acts as a cooperative relay to assist the information transmission between a primary transmitter and multiple primary receivers. In return for the cooperation, the secondary node enjoys access to the primary user’s spectrum for its own information transfer. Specifically, by employing a time-switching based receiver, the secondary node harvests energy from the received radio-frequency signal of primary transmitter during a dedicated energy harvesting phase. In the subsequent information transfer phase, the secondary node splits the harvested power to forward the primary data as well as its own information intended for another secondary user. We analyze the impact of decoding primary’s information at the secondary receiver on the performance of secondary network. Importantly, we propose an improved energy harvesting-based relaying scheme which makes an efficient use of available degrees of freedom and thereby enhances the performance of both primary and secondary networks significantly. For this analytical framework, we derive the expressions of outage probability for primary and secondary networks. Numerical and simulation results are obtained to extract various useful insights and to validate our theoretical developments.

Ambient backscatter communication (AmBC) is an emerging technology that has the potential to offer spectral- and energy-efficient solutions for the next generation wireless communications networks, especially for the Internet of Things (IoT). Intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) are also perceived to be an integral part of the beyond 5G systems to complement the traditional relaying scheme. To this end, this paper proposes a novel system design that enables the co-existence of a backscattering secondary system with the legacy primary system. This co-existence is primarily driven by leveraging the AmBC technique in IRS-assisted unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) networks. More specifically, an aerial-IRS mounted on a UAV is considered to be employed for cooperatively relaying the transmitted signal from a terrestrial primary source node to a user equipment on the ground. Meanwhile, capitalizing on the AmBC technology, a backscatter capable terrestrial secondary node transmits its information to a terrestrial secondary receiver by modulating and backscattering the ambient relayed radio frequency signals from the UAV-IRS. We comprehensively analyze the performance of the proposed design framework with co-existing systems by deriving the outage probability and ergodic spectral efficiency expressions. Moreover, we also investigate the asymptotic behavior of outage performance in high transmit power regimes for both primary and secondary systems. Importantly, we analyze the performance of the primary system by considering two different scenarios, i.e., optimal phase shifts design and random phase shifting at IRS. Finally, based on the analytical performance assessment, we present numerical results to provide various useful insights and also provide simulation results to corroborate the derived theoretical results.