Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine May 2018 - 66

Industry Insights:

DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2018.170101

Place-Time Responsive Network: An Approach to the
Perennial Clandestine Challenge
Ambuj Kumar, Ramjee Prasad, Aarhus University, Herning, Denmark

INTRODUCTION
The last few decades witnessed substantial growth in information
and communication technology pertaining to mobile wireless communications (MWC), and that growth is expected to continue. In a
report on mobile business, Raconteur [1] provided recent updates
on all the developments happening in the area of MWC, including
the fifth generation of wireless communications (5G) that is on the
verge of making a footfall in the wireless communications arena.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) World Business Report talk show [2], calls attention to the keen interest shown by
various firms attending the 2017 Mobile Wireless Congress held
in Barcelona, Spain in enforcing the data plans for the 5G technology before its implementation. In addition, according to the documents released by the GSM Association (GSMA) [3], a trade body
representing the interests of mobile network operators worldwide,
there will soon be about 5.7 billion mobile subscribers and 9.7 billion user connections. A lot of credit for this boom goes to the
handheld devices, also known as smartphones, which are becoming sleeker, smarter, and cheaper and fit right in the users' pockets.
Besides the growth in users already witnessed, the GSMA documents [3] also show that by 2020, the expected number of smart
devices will reach 5.7 billion globally, and populous countries like
India and China will contribute most to this growth of users and
smartphones.
Beneath all the developments that have happened so far, and
those that will occur in future, there exists a compelling entity supporting all the technological phases that will be walked out step
by step in the due course of time. We call this entity the Mobile
Wireless Communication Architecture (MWCA). The purpose of
the MWCA is to cater to users across a geographical area, such as
cities, towns, and villages and therefore, convolves with the terrestrial infrastructure. The ground-based infrastructures carry the
equipment that is necessary for the network operation and its elements are placed strategically across the network service area to
illuminate the network services in the region with a considerable
Authors' address: School of Business and Social Sciences,
Aarhus University, Birk Centerpark 15, CGC LAB, DK-7400,
Herning, Denmark 91741980, E-mail: (ambuj@btech.au.dk).
Manuscript received May 30, 2017, revised November 14,
2017, and ready for publication December 5, 2017.
Review handled by L. Ligthart.
0885/8985/18/$26.00 © 2018 IEEE
66

level of quality. Figure 1 shows a typical terrestrial wireless communication network (WCN) that follows an architectural hierarchy, which is laid across the area over the terrestrial infrastructure.
Since its inception, the sole purpose of wireless communications has been to provide services with mobility to the users.
Overlooking the starting generations, the architecture of all further
generations has incorporated features to manage the movement of
users. However, for most of the network deployment, the raising of
infrastructure is performed as a distinct task and is generally disconnected from the architectural paradigm. Due to this disconnect,
there is a substantial limitation in catering to mobility. Users, when
moving in groups or gathering at some locations, tend to surpass
the mobility management capabilities of a WCN. In our previous
works in [4] and [5], we have identified the problems that arise due
to random user accumulations and user movements in large groups
as place-time events and defined the place-time variant coverage
and capacity demands as the Place Time Coverage (PTCo) and
Place Time Capacity (PTC).
Apart from our previous work in [5], which is a PhD dissertation, and work by Purnima et al. in [6], no previous work has ever
investigated place-time challenges in a WCN.
The Communication, Navigation, Sensing, and Services
(CONASENSE) society [7] has the unique concept of integrating
communication, navigation, sensing, and service dimensions in a holistic approach addressing combined technological and social issues.
In this article, we will broadly discuss what we mean by PlaceTime dependent network dimensions, how the Place-Time variant
parameters affect system behaviour, what our findings and propositions are, and how these offerings will mitigate the challenges of
catering to social network users.

PERENNIAL CLANDESTINE PROBLEM OF NETWORK
PLANNING
In this section, we will discuss conventional WCN planning and its
limitation and how the Place-Time dependent parameters remain
unaddressed with this approach.

CONVENTIONAL NETWORK PLANNING AND
DIMENSIONING
The following points are taken into account when planning a WCN
for an area.

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