FLEX: Joint UL/DL and QoS-Aware Scheduling for Dynamic TDD in Industrial 5G and Beyond
🤖 AI Summary
This work addresses the challenge that static time-slot configurations in industrial 5G TDD networks struggle to accommodate dynamic asymmetric traffic and diverse QoS requirements. To overcome this limitation, the authors propose FLEX, a scheduler that dynamically adjusts the uplink-downlink ratio of flexible TDD slots to align with industrial traffic characteristics while preserving bidirectional QoS priorities. FLEX incorporates a downlink buffer-state-aware scheduling mechanism that leverages the deterministic nature of industrial traffic to prevent starvation of high-priority downlink flows and achieve low-latency transmission. Simulations based on 5G LENA and ns-3 demonstrate that FLEX meets stringent bidirectional QoS constraints with high fidelity, introduces less than one slot of additional latency for deterministic traffic, and maintains throughput comparable to existing schedulers.
Application Category
📝 Abstract
Industrial 5G deployments using Time Division Duplex (TDD) networks face a critical challenge: existing schedulers rely on static configuration of Uplink (UL) to Downlink (DL) resource ratios, failing to adapt to dynamic asymmetric traffic demands. This limitation is particularly problematic in Industry 4.0 scenarios where traffic patterns exhibit significant asymmetry between directions and heterogeneous Quality of Service (QoS) requirements. We present FLEX, a novel QoS-aware scheduler that dynamically adjusts the UL/DL ratio in flexible TDD slots while respecting diverse QoS requirements. FLEX introduces DL buffer state estimation to prevent starvation of high-priority DL traffic, exploiting the deterministic nature of industrial traffic patterns for accurate predictions. Through extensive simulations of industrial scenarios using 5G LENA and ns-3, we demonstrate that FLEX achieves similar throughput compared to established scheduling while correctly enforcing QoS priorities in both traffic directions. For deterministic traffic patterns, FLEX maintains minimal latency overhead (less than 1 slot duration), making it particularly suitable for industrial automation applications.
Problem
Research questions and friction points this paper is trying to address.
Dynamic TDD
UL/DL asymmetry
QoS-aware scheduling
Industrial 5G
Resource allocation
Innovation
Methods, ideas, or system contributions that make the work stand out.
Dynamic TDD
QoS-aware scheduling
UL/DL ratio adaptation
Industrial 5G
Buffer state estimation
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