Data-Driven Adaptive Resource Allocation for Reliable Low-Latency Uplink Communications in Rural Cellular 5G Multi-Connectivity

2026-04-27

AI Summary

This study addresses the challenge of meeting ultra-reliable low-latency communication requirements in rural 5G deployments, where uplink performance is constrained by limited radio resources and power control. Through empirical evaluation of commercial 5G non-standalone networks, the work reveals a nonlinear relationship between coverage metrics—such as Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP)—and actual link performance. To overcome these limitations, the authors propose the Primary-Anchored Adaptive Failover (PAAF) framework, which dynamically activates redundant transmission based on real-time wireless conditions, latency constraints, and service cost. PAAF incorporates a partial packet duplication mechanism that achieves reliability close to full multi-connectivity while substantially reducing redundancy overhead. Experimental results in rural environments demonstrate that this adaptive resource allocation strategy effectively balances reliability and efficiency, validating the practicality of the proposed approach.

Technology Category

• Planning, Routing, and Scheduling: Scheduling under Uncertainty
• Multiagent Systems: Agent Communication
• Search and Optimization: Sampling/Simulation-based Search

Application Category

• Systems and Infrastructure for Web, Mobile and WoT: Energy management for devices in mobile Web and WoT environments
• Search and Retrieval-Augmented AI: Web evaluation methodologies and metrics
• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Incentives in network design for Web infrastructures and ecosystems

Abstract

Reliable low-latency communication is a key requirement for mission-critical and mobile autonomous systems, including teleoperation, autonomous navigation, and real-time uplink-dominant telemetry applications. While commercial 5G networks often provide adequate downlink performance, uplink performance in rural deployments may be constrained by radio-resource limitations and uplink power-control mechanisms. This paper presents a comprehensive experimental evaluation of multi-connectivity strategies over commercial 5G Non-Standalone networks, based on measurement campaigns conducted in urban, suburban, and rural environments. The study analyzes per-packet uplink and downlink latency, packet loss, and radio-layer KPIs across two mobile network operators. The measurements indicate that latency and reliability cannot be inferred solely from coverage indicators such as RSRP. In coverage-constrained scenarios, performance appears to be strongly influenced by uplink power-limited operation and partially correlated impairments across operators. Several multi-connectivity strategies are evaluated, including link aggregation, switching-based policies, and conditional packet duplication. A Primary-Anchored Adaptive Failover (PAAF) framework is introduced to selectively activate redundancy based on radio, latency and service cost considerations. The results suggest that Partial Duplication (PD) approaches can approach the reliability of multi-connectivity while substantially reducing duplication overhead in the evaluated rural scenario.

Problem

• low-latency
• uplink communication
• rural 5G
• reliability
• multi-connectivity

Innovation

• multi-connectivity
• adaptive resource allocation
• low-latency uplink
• Partial Duplication
• PAAF