Analysis of Vegetation and Penetration Losses in 5G mmWave Communication Systems

Abstract

The 5G network has been intensively studied within the early deployment stages as an effort to match the exponential growth of the number of connected devices and users, alongside with their increasing demands for higher throughput, bandwidth, and lower latency. Knowing that most of the frequency spectrum below 6 GHz is saturated, it is not feasible to rely only on the traditional frequency bands that are currently in use. Therefore, a promising solution to combat the insufficient frequency spectrum is to adopt new frequency bands for next-generation mobile communication systems. The primary effort has been focused on utilizing the millimeter-wave (mmWave) bands as the most promising candidate for the frequency spectrum. However, even though the mmWave frequency bands could fulfill the desired bandwidth requirements of 5G, it has been demonstrated to endure several issues such as scattering, atmospheric absorption, fading, and especially penetration losses compared to the existing sub-6 GHz frequency bands. Then, it is fundamental to optimize the mmWave band propagation channel to facilitate the practical 5G implementation for the network operators. In this paper, we simulated different scenarios in order to study the vegetation and penetration loss in 5G systems. Vegetation loss will be studied using the 28 GHz bandwidth and for the penetration loss we will study soft materials <15dB and hard materials >20dB.

Traffic-Aware Optimal Multi-Beam Resource Allocation in 5G Networks Impaired by Rain and Foliage

“…The foliage attenuation in dB is expressed as [4] γ foliage = 0.2 f 0.3 MHz ×d 0.6 f , where f MHz is the operating frequency in MHz and d f is the depth of foliage. Thus, the optimization problem for maximizing the coverage radius of gNB in the presence of foliage attenuation can be formulated as max r r (7a)…”

“…Olyacc et al [3] have further analyzed the impact of rainfall and sand dust storm on the performance of mm-wave bands at frequency bands of 24/28/38/75 GHz. Further, Barb et al [4] have carried out simulations to study the vegetation loss in the 28 GHz mm-wave frequency band. A ray-tracing method has been adopted in [5] to study the impact of rainfall in mm-wave frequency bands.…”

A Survey on Handover and Mobility Management in 5G HetNets: Current State, Challenges, and Future Directions

“…The 5G-NR utilizes both the sub-6 GHz spectrum (non-mmWave) and mmWave band (high frequency). The former is used to provide service over a wider coverage area due to better penetration depth and lower penetration losses, while the latter is responsible for serving users over a smaller coverage area due to high penetration losses [48][49][50]. In addition, 5G is capable of supporting wider bandwidths up to 400 MHz, which represents a substantial increase compared to 4G LTE-A.…”

Metamaterial-Based Series-Fed Antenna with a High Gain and Wideband Performance for Millimeter-Wave Spectrum Applications

“…Nevertheless, the MMW band experiences a high path loss and interference when contrasted with sub-6 GHz frequencies [6]. Furthermore, vegetation and penetration losses become significant considerations when working in the MMW band [7]. Antennas with a high gain are instrumental in mitigating path loss, while simultaneously, there is a growing demand for dual/multi-beam antennas to effectively combat the challenges posed by multipath fading and interference effects [8,9].…”