SliceNet contribution accepted by IEEE Transactions on Broadcasting

IEEE Transactions on Broadcasting (TBC) has recently accepted a SliceNet contribution “Enable Advanced QoS-Aware Network Slicing in 5G Networks for Slice-Based Media Use Cases”. TBC is an internationally leading journal on broadcasting, and communications and networking in a wider context. The paper presents some of the latest achievements from SliceNet in the design, prototyping and empirical evaluation of advanced network slicing with controlled Quality of Service (QoS) in 5G networks for media use cases.

In particular, a set of innovative SliceNet enablers are described in details, covering network slicing over radio access network and core network, a low-latency multi-access edge computing (MEC) platform, a hardware-accelerated programmable data plane, plug and play (P&P) control for customised network slicing, and a one-stop interface for vertical businesses. The paper combines all these key enablers in the SliceNet framework to address the mission-critical application requirements in the SliceNet media-rich eHealth use case.

5G PPP Phase 2 Key Achievements

5G PPP PHASE 2 KEY ACHIEVEMENTS, prepared by the 5G PPP Technology Board, are available here

SliceNet is listed in the achievements here under the 5G Multi-Domains Multi-Tenants Plug & Play  Control Plane and Slicing Control icon, where the project results are described under Multi-Domain Multi-Tenants Network Slicing and Plug & Play Control for Verticals. SliceNet defines business roles and enabling mechanisms to achieve cross-domain network slicing for the agreed Service Level Agreement. Furthermore, SliceNet Plug & Play control plane provides a per-slice control environment, which offers verticals and consumers, a significantly enhanced degree of flexibility for deploying services. 

SliceNet 5G RAN-Core slicing infrastructure

SliceNet has recently proceeded with the design and implementation of a 5G RAN-Core slicing-friendly infrastructure supporting control and data plane programmability based on the FlexRAN and LL-MEC Mosaic5G platforms on top of the OAI RAN and OAI CN deployment. Ongoing work includes the design and prototype implementation of a RAN monitoring framework extension over FlexRAN that will provide raw material to QoE monitoring and machine learning-based models for resource optimization.

There are two network cognition strands: first, an integrated methodology approach to cognitive network & slice management for designing, implementing and running cognitive models; second, on the aspects of cognitive control to support QoS/QoE in RAN slicing.

SliceNet workshop at UPC premises in Barcelona

On 23-24 January 2019, an internal SliceNet meeting was held at the UPC premises in Barcelona. The purpose of the meeting was to review the availability and maturity of work packages WP4-WP5-WP6 components towards the integration to be done in the framework of WP8. Moreover, deep discussion on the QoS and QoE monitoring design and prototyping was conducted.

SliceNet Plug and Play control framework used as a SmartGrid slice

The Plug & Play (P&P) control framework implements the principles of SliceNet vertical-in-the-loop. It also exposes to verticals a set of tailored slice control functions, based on their requirements. The framework is accessible through a customized GUI where all of the slice elements are represented as an interactive graph.

The demo video shows the principles that have driven the design of the P&P control framework, its role in the SliceNet architecture and the microservice implementation approach. This approach is largely based on the use of Docker software containers and Kubernetes as container orchestrator, along with P&P control deployment, configuration and use.

In the demo video, the P&P control is used as a SmartGrid slice, with the vertical enabled to retrieve its customized slice topology view and monitoring information, as well as to modify the slice composition (e.g. by including new User Equipment in the slice) and provide QoE feedback towards the SliceNet system, triggering an automated optimization of the slice capacity.

Please find a link to the demo video as shown at ICT2018 here.

Smart Grid use case testbed at Altice Labs

SliceNet Smart Grid
Smart Grid use case infrastructure

The SliceNet Smart Grid use case testbed is currently being deployed in Aveiro. The tesbed is hosted in two different sites:

  • Altice Labs – in Altice Labs we have the 5G network management
  • IT (Instituto de Telecomunicações) – in IT we deploy the 5G network infrastructure and the Vertical devices (IEDs).

There is a phased iterative plan for the use case testbed deployment, vertical integration and validation tests.

  • Phase 1 will start with the 5G service subscription, which should provide the vertical with the necessary resources for remote engineering and monitoring and device-to-device communication.
  • Phase 2 will include a network of Efacec IEDs (Intelligent Electronic Devices) communicating with each other via IEC 61850 R-GOOSE (Routable-Generic Object Oriented Substation Events).
  • Phase 3 will cover the more demanding power grid protection and self-healing algorithm simulations.