AI-Based Channel Prediction in D2D Links: An Empirical Validation

Device-to-Device (D2D) communication propelled by artificial intelligence (AI) will be an allied technology that will improve system performance and support new services in advanced wireless networks (5G, 6G and beyond). In this paper, AI-based deep learning techniques are applied to D2D links operating at 5.8 GHz with the aim at providing potential answers to the following questions concerning the prediction of the received signal strength variations:
i) how effective is the prediction as a function of the coherence time of the channel?
and
ii) what is the minimum number of input samples required for a target prediction performance?
To this end, a variety of measurement environments and scenarios are considered, including an indoor open-office area, an outdoor open-space, line of sight (LOS), non-LOS (NLOS), and mobile scenarios. Four deep learning models are explored, namely long short-term memory networks (LSTMs), gated recurrent units (GRUs), convolutional neural networks (CNNs), and dense or feedforward networks (FFNs). Linear regression is used as a baseline model. It is observed that GRUs and LSTMs present equivalent performance, and both are superior when compared to CNNs, FFNs and linear regression. This indicates that GRUs and LSTMs are able to better account for temporal dependencies in the D2D data sets. We also provide recommendations on the minimum input lengths that yield the required performance given the channel coherence time. For instance, to predict 17 and 23 ms into the future, in indoor and outdoor LOS environments, respectively, an input length of 25 ms is recommended. This indicates that the bulk of the learning is done within the coherence time of the channel, and that large input lengths may not always be beneficial.