Coordinated project SOFIA integrates the work of three partners, one group from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M), one group from Centre Tecnològic de Telecomunicacions de Catalunya (CTTC), and one group from Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB).

The main goal of SOFIA is to explore the road to developing a four-dimensional (4D) system that can offer reliable, ubiquitous, continuous, flexible, dynamic, and cost-efficient connectivity for 6G communications and contributing, at the same time, to the economic and environmental sustainability of the future networks. Those networks are traditionally designed to provide connectivity for a quasi-bi-directional space. The 4D network in SOFIA is achieved by extending and complementing the two-dimensional terrestrial network with a non-terrestrial component and integrating the sensing to improve performance, flexibility, reliability, and sustainability as new network dimensions.

One of the main research lines for 6G includes the integration of sensing and communications. Hence, SOFIA will accomplish this 4D network by enhancing not only the already deployed terrestrial and non-terrestrial systems but also integrating sensing into the picture. Thus, a wide range of expertise is needed to achieve the foreseen enhancement including satellite communication techniques, general wireless physical layer design, and efficient radio resource management strategies. Although each area of research is wide enough to motivate a project on its own, independent execution of the three subprojects will lead to inefficient solutions and probably to erroneous designs. The solid and deep experience in physical layer technique allows UC3M to lead the novel research integrating sensing into physical layer. The strong background in satellite communication will enable CTTC to lead the development in that dimension. Similarly, the strong expertise in Radio Resource Management (RRM) will enable UIB to lead the related research within SOFIA acting as a glue. The SOFIA concept is shown in the figure. The coordinated project will guarantee the design of optimized and holistic solutions that overcome the inefficiency of the single subproject solution.

FUNDING