CIOInsider India Magazine

As India prepares to roll out high-speed 6G communication services by 2030, the government has established the Bharat 6G initiative to discover and support the development and implementation of the next-generation technology in the nation. The government has also appointed an apex council to oversee the project and concentrate on matters like standardization, identification of the spectrum for 6G usages, creation of an ecosystem for devices and systems, and determining finances for research and development, among other things. India's 6G project will be implemented in two phases.

The newly formed council will aid and finance 6G technology research and development, design, and development by Indian start-ups, businesses, research institutions, and universities. The council will also aim to help India become a global hub of intellectual property, goods, and solutions of inexpensive 6G telecom solutions, identifying priority areas for India-centric 6G researches.

6G Vision
The 6G vision of the government was presented by the prime minister. According to the Department of Telecom's vision paper, 6G technology is anticipated to deliver ultra-low latency and speeds up to 1 terabit per second, which is 1,000 times faster than the highest speed of 5G. In comparison, 5G technology is anticipated to give rates ranging from 40 to 1,100 Mbps.

India's developing digital economy necessitates a different regulatory strategy than traditional economies. Because data privacy and telecommunications are concerns that affect many different industries, the government decided to create policies that are technology-neutral.

Future legislation will be based on principles rather than particular, such as the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill and the new Telecommunications Bill. The minister also addressed the India Telecom exhibition, where over 20 businesses with local manufacturing capabilities are presenting their solutions. Participants in the event came from 30 different nations, including Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Mauritius, the US, and Russia.

Antennas to Empower 6G Technology
The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) is home to researchers that are developing antennas that will support 6G technology, which is vital to establishing effective V2X (Vehicle to Everything) connections. In a recent study, the team, under the direction of Debdeep Sarkar, Assistant Professor at the Department of Electrical Communication Engineering, demonstrates how self-interference in full-duplex communication antennas can be reduced, leading to faster and more bandwidth-efficient signal transmission across the communication network.

A transmitter and a receiver are used in full-duplex antennas to transmit and receive radio waves. Customary radio transceivers are half duplex, which means there is a delay between the signal sent and the signal received, or they use distinct frequency signals for both transmitting and receiving. This delay is required to prevent interference, as the signals transmitted back and forth should not cross paths with one another, much like when two individuals are conversing simultaneously without pausing to listen to one another. Yet, this also affects how quickly and efficiently signals are transferred.

Full-duplex systems, where both the transmitter and receiver may operate signals of the same frequency simultaneously, are necessary in order to send data much more quickly and effectively. Eliminating self-interference is crucial for such systems. During the past few years, Sarkar and Jogesh Chandra Dash, a postdoctoral scholar at the IoE-IISc, have been working on this. The overarching goal of the research aims to get rid of the signal that comes from self-interference.

Two Ways to Cancel Self-Interference - Passive and Active
Passive cancellation is accomplished without using any additional equipment by simply structuring the circuit in a specific way (for example, increasing the distance between the two antennas). In order to remove the self-interference, active cancellation uses additional components such as signal processing units. However, the components required for these procedures might add bulk and expense to the antenna.

Instead, a small, reasonably priced antenna that is simple to incorporate into the rest of any device's electronics is required. By nature of its design, the aerial created by Sarkar and Dash relies on passive interference to function as a full-duplex system. It has two ports, each of which has the ability to function as a transmitter or receiver.

Via metallic vias, two ports are electromagnetically separated from one another. Metallic vias are holes punched into the antenna's metal surface that cause the electric field to be disrupted. The team was able to create a cost-effective and small solution while also passively canceling out the majority of the interference.

"We are eliminating all the conventional techniques for self-interference cancellation, and we are integrating a very simple structure that can be installed in a car," says Dash.

The team's immediate goals are to refine their technique to completely eliminate passive interference and decrease the size of the aerial. According to sources, this technology can then readily be installed onto a vehicle where it can transmit and receive data at very fast speeds, bringing 6G mobile connectivity and autonomous operation closer to reality.

6G’s Impact on Business
6G will ignite the metaverse. Although the term 'metaverse' is fairly popular in IT circles right now, even 5G can't provide the bandwidth required for real-time, rendered, customized 3D landscapes. Yet, 6G will be able to provide that bandwidth and speed, allowing tech oligopolies to build an immersive, persistent, and completely integrated virtual metaverse. Furthermore, introducing 6G technology will result in an even wider variety of smart gadgets. There will be a huge increase in the number of world wide web devices in our society that can transmit and gather data. The growing Internet of Things (IoT) and this pervasive intelligence will enable seamless connectivity between both online and offline experiences.

We will meet in 3D virtual environments where our avatars will make eye contact in real-time rather than devoting hours to 2D Zoom or Teams sessions. We'll be able to communicate in groups and even show body language live. We could just swap out everyone and select a private online space if we needed to have a one-on-one meeting. Furthermore, you could simply fly or teleport to a digital twin and experience it there if you wanted to visit a factory or try out a product.