Boosting power efficiency of physical-layer secured MIMO communications
Lead Research Organisation:
Heriot-Watt University
Department Name: Sch of Engineering and Physical Science
Abstract
Today, hardly a week passes by without major incidents of cybercrime, which are constantly encroaching on the security and privacy confidence of each connected individual and the Nation as a whole. The increasingly prevalent wireless information exchanges face even greater challenges as the information is broadcast in open medium and the portable communication devices, e.g. mobile phones and laptops, are unlikely to be equipped with costly and power-hungry cryptographic solutions, especially in the coming quantum era. The physical-layer wireless security has long been regarded as a promising complementary or alternative as it requires little computation capability while endowing systems quantum-immune security. However, to date this is achieved by radiating a significantly more amount of energy in the form of orthogonal artificial noise (AN). This power penalty can be huge, e.g. in some typical application scenarios more than twice as much as the energy is radiated. This, unfortunately, is contrary to the global urgent needs of cutting energy consumption of wireless communication systems and their associated carbon footprint, rendering the current physical-layer wireless security solutions impractical.
This project will be the first systematic study of the physical-layer wireless security under the energy awareness context. We propose to recover the energy penalty of the physical-layer security solutions without compromising security performance. This ambitious vision becomes achievable when a co-design approach, involving transmitter architecture, digital baseband, RF frontend and signal waveforms, is employed. This will require major innovations that currently lie beyond state-of-the-art, which include (a) system architecture- and modulation-aware AN synthesis; (b) non-linear power amplifier-friendly AN synthesis; (c) digital/analogue hybrid modulation and precoding security scheme; and (d) system-level demonstration of physical-layer security solutions. We are not aware of any other research programme that has systematically studied hardware-aware optimum signal waveform synthesis for energy efficient physical-layer wireless security systems.
The partnerships with Toshiba Research Europe (TRE), Ampleon, National Instruments (NI) and Winspread have been specifically established to ensure the successfully delivery of the research programme in every stage. In particular, (a) TRE will provide wireless threat assessment in various application scenarios to ensure the planned research is aligned with the society needs; (b) TRE and Ampleon will provide power amplifier samples and expertise on accurate non-linear power amplifier modelling and characterisation; (c) NI will guide the system integration and demonstration using its USRP platform; (d) Winspread will facilitate small-scale trial of the developed technology through its commercial 4G LTE base-stations.
This two-year research programme will be highlighted through two high-impact practical demonstrators. We firstly intend to show a real-time wireless high-definition video secure wireless transmission in laboratory multipath environment using a bespoke designed physical-layer air interface. The power efficiency improvement will be sufficient to recover the power penalty suffered in the current benchmark physical-layer security solutions. In order to further promote the research outcomes onto the global stage, we plan to integrate the develop security technology onto commercial WiFi and 4G-LTE base-stations.
This project will be the first systematic study of the physical-layer wireless security under the energy awareness context. We propose to recover the energy penalty of the physical-layer security solutions without compromising security performance. This ambitious vision becomes achievable when a co-design approach, involving transmitter architecture, digital baseband, RF frontend and signal waveforms, is employed. This will require major innovations that currently lie beyond state-of-the-art, which include (a) system architecture- and modulation-aware AN synthesis; (b) non-linear power amplifier-friendly AN synthesis; (c) digital/analogue hybrid modulation and precoding security scheme; and (d) system-level demonstration of physical-layer security solutions. We are not aware of any other research programme that has systematically studied hardware-aware optimum signal waveform synthesis for energy efficient physical-layer wireless security systems.
The partnerships with Toshiba Research Europe (TRE), Ampleon, National Instruments (NI) and Winspread have been specifically established to ensure the successfully delivery of the research programme in every stage. In particular, (a) TRE will provide wireless threat assessment in various application scenarios to ensure the planned research is aligned with the society needs; (b) TRE and Ampleon will provide power amplifier samples and expertise on accurate non-linear power amplifier modelling and characterisation; (c) NI will guide the system integration and demonstration using its USRP platform; (d) Winspread will facilitate small-scale trial of the developed technology through its commercial 4G LTE base-stations.
This two-year research programme will be highlighted through two high-impact practical demonstrators. We firstly intend to show a real-time wireless high-definition video secure wireless transmission in laboratory multipath environment using a bespoke designed physical-layer air interface. The power efficiency improvement will be sufficient to recover the power penalty suffered in the current benchmark physical-layer security solutions. In order to further promote the research outcomes onto the global stage, we plan to integrate the develop security technology onto commercial WiFi and 4G-LTE base-stations.
Planned Impact
This project aims to remove the barriers hindering the large-scale deployment of the physical-layer security in diverse wireless communication systems. Thus, it has direct impact on the wireless cyber security, which is indispensable to realise the future Connected Nation. The physical-layer wireless security plays as the complementary or alternative solution to the current higher-layer cryptographic protocols, and, importantly, it enjoys the ultimate resilience to the forthcoming quantum computing. The technology to be developed in this project and, later, to be deployed beyond the project is able to reduce the data overhead used in the current encryption algorithms and remove the needs of security key management infrastructure. These benefits, together with the recovery of the significant power penalty suffered in the previous physical-layer security designs, will facilitate the industrial uptake, and, in the long-term, fundamentally revolute the wireless cyber security landscape.
On the society aspect, the technology to be developed will significantly improve the power efficiency of physical-layer secured wireless links. This aligns well with the urgent needs of reducing the carbon footprints of the current power-hungry wireless infrastructure. On the other hand, the enhancement of the confidence on security and privacy protection will accelerate the use and acceptance of a multitude of applications that rely on sensitive personal information, such as e-banking, e-commerce and e-healthcare, etc.
Project industrial partners will benefit directly by consolidating their leadership positions. The project insight on hardware-aware physical-layer wireless security will provide Toshiba Research Europe opportunities to incorporate its strength in power amplifier characterisation into the flagship SWAN (Secure Wireless Agile Networks, EPSRC EP/T005572/1) project. The impact of power amplifier behaviours on system performance revealed in the research programme will be fed back to the partner Ampleon. This will provide useful guidance on its future product designs, including power transistors and their associated modelling and pre-distortion algorithms. The USRP platform from the National Instruments will be used differently as the appended bespoke RF frontends will be monitored and optimised. This is distinct to its general use as a fast prototyping tool for implementing various wireless baseband algorithms, wherein RF frontends are transparent to developers. The efforts that will be made to implement the lab demonstrators will illustrate the important values of the USRPs on RF and Microwave research. Lastly, as the major customers of Winspread are private and emergency wireless communication providers, the wireless security is of high importance. Thus, the technology to be delivered in the research project has potential to become the unique selling point of its private network products.
The knowledge generated in this cross-disciplinary project will be fed into the curriculums that will be delivered in the Heriot-Watt UK and oversea campuses. In addition, a number of highly relevant public engagement events (see details in 'Pathways to Impact') are built into the programme. All these will ensure the long-term impact of (a) passing the state-of-the-art knowledge and skills beyond the research team; (b) inspiring future research and industrial leaders; (c) allowing the general public to connect with the research team; and (d) promoting STEM in general. Whenever possible, the research data and outcomes will be deposited in public domains (e.g. University data repository and PI's personal website) to facilitate the validation and the continuity of the future research.
On the society aspect, the technology to be developed will significantly improve the power efficiency of physical-layer secured wireless links. This aligns well with the urgent needs of reducing the carbon footprints of the current power-hungry wireless infrastructure. On the other hand, the enhancement of the confidence on security and privacy protection will accelerate the use and acceptance of a multitude of applications that rely on sensitive personal information, such as e-banking, e-commerce and e-healthcare, etc.
Project industrial partners will benefit directly by consolidating their leadership positions. The project insight on hardware-aware physical-layer wireless security will provide Toshiba Research Europe opportunities to incorporate its strength in power amplifier characterisation into the flagship SWAN (Secure Wireless Agile Networks, EPSRC EP/T005572/1) project. The impact of power amplifier behaviours on system performance revealed in the research programme will be fed back to the partner Ampleon. This will provide useful guidance on its future product designs, including power transistors and their associated modelling and pre-distortion algorithms. The USRP platform from the National Instruments will be used differently as the appended bespoke RF frontends will be monitored and optimised. This is distinct to its general use as a fast prototyping tool for implementing various wireless baseband algorithms, wherein RF frontends are transparent to developers. The efforts that will be made to implement the lab demonstrators will illustrate the important values of the USRPs on RF and Microwave research. Lastly, as the major customers of Winspread are private and emergency wireless communication providers, the wireless security is of high importance. Thus, the technology to be delivered in the research project has potential to become the unique selling point of its private network products.
The knowledge generated in this cross-disciplinary project will be fed into the curriculums that will be delivered in the Heriot-Watt UK and oversea campuses. In addition, a number of highly relevant public engagement events (see details in 'Pathways to Impact') are built into the programme. All these will ensure the long-term impact of (a) passing the state-of-the-art knowledge and skills beyond the research team; (b) inspiring future research and industrial leaders; (c) allowing the general public to connect with the research team; and (d) promoting STEM in general. Whenever possible, the research data and outcomes will be deposited in public domains (e.g. University data repository and PI's personal website) to facilitate the validation and the continuity of the future research.
People |
ORCID iD |
Yuan Ding (Principal Investigator) |
Publications
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Yang Y
(2022)
Electromagnetic shielding using flexible embroidery metamaterial absorbers: Design, analysis and experiments
in Materials & Design
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Xu K
(2022)
Reconfigurable Power Divider-Enabled Dynamic Hybrid m-MIMO Transmitter
in IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Sun M
(2022)
Joint Digital Analogue DVB-S2(X) Link Optimization in Non-Linear Channel
in IEEE Access
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Sun M
(2021)
Wireless-powered CR-IoT with ambient backscattering: a new transmission mode
in IET Communications
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Song C
(2022)
Advances in Wirelessly Powered Backscatter Communications: From Antenna/RF Circuitry Design to Printed Flexible Electronics
in Proceedings of the IEEE
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Purushothama J
(2023)
Synthesis of Energy Efficiency-Enhanced Directional Modulation Transmitters
in IEEE Transactions on Green Communications and Networking
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Peng H
(2022)
Covert non-orthogonal multiple access communication assisted by multi-antenna jamming
in Physical Communication
Description | In the first year, we discovered the way of controlling the signal peak to average power ration (PAPR) of the directional modulation technology. Two approaches have been developed. One is to scale up the artificial interference power that is injected on the symbols with low energy. The other more rigorous method is to find a vector trajectory in IQ plane at the receiver end. This provides an analytical way to control and system power efficiency and the wireless security performance. A few papers have been published, and some more papers will be submitted. The team aims to develop the prototype that can demonstrate all these proposed concept in the remaining time of this project. In the second year, we managed to use Van Atta array to construct a retrodirective based secure wireless communication system. In addition, we also studied the radio frequency fingerprints using nonlinear memory effect that is from the cascade of RRC and PA. The coloured constellation contour can be used to securely identify the different wireless devices by using simple CNN based machine learning algorithms. |
Exploitation Route | The project aims to develop a wireless security approach for active antenna arrays using some digital approaches. The investigator will attempt to further develop this method for the use of ultra-low power wireless systems where digital resources are limited. Thus, novel analogue circuits will be studies for this IoT type applications |
Sectors | Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Electronics |
Description | The concept of this project has been further explained to DSTL, and a project of backscatter communication has been funded through DASA. Security aspect of the DASA project is built upon the outcome of this EPSRC project. The DM concept was also combined with secure backscatter communications. |
First Year Of Impact | 2022 |
Sector | Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Electronics |
Impact Types | Policy & public services |