Fractional Doppler Effects on OTFS-NOMA HetNets with Mixed-Mobility Users

Heterogeneous networks (HetNets) are considered a promising approach to meet the increasing throughput requirements of 6G vehicular networks. The integration of orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) modulation and non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) has demonstrated significant improvements in the reliability of wireless networks under mixed-mobility. Applying this combination in HetNets helps accommodate high-mobility (HM) and low-mobility (LM) users while effectively addressing high Doppler shifts. However, in practical scenarios, fractional Doppler arises from the mismatch between the actual Doppler frequency and its discrete representation on the DD grid. This effect leads to inter-Doppler interference (IDI) that can significantly degrade detection performance. In our work, we investigate the effect of fractional Doppler on OTFS-NOMA systems under mixed-mobility conditions and analyze how NOMA power allocation can be optimized to mitigate the resulting performance degradation. OTFS modulation is used for the HM user, while the LM users' symbols are embedded in the time-frequency (TF) domain. Minimum mean square error (MMSE) detection is utilized under multiple assumptions regarding the knowledge of the IDI parameters. We investigate the impact of optimizing NOMA power allocation on the overall system performance. The purpose of this work is to analyze the impact of fractional Doppler in OTFS-NOMA systems in HetNets rather than proposing new detection algorithms for OTFS modulation. The results validate the significant performance impact of fractional Doppler on the system and demonstrate the role of power allocation in mitigating IDI effects in terms of spectral efficiency and number of users served.

Adaptive Wavelet Division Multiplexing for Heterogeneous Mobility Users

This paper proposes an adaptive wavelet division multiplexing scheme for wireless systems serving users with heterogeneous mobility profiles over frequency-selective Rayleigh fading channels. By exploiting the multiresolution structure of the discrete wavelet transform (DWT), users are adaptively assigned to different decomposition levels according to their channel dynamics and Doppler conditions. A single-tap minimum mean square error (MMSE) equalizer is applied in the frequency domain, and the system performance is evaluated under realistic time-varying multipath fading environments. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed adaptive allocation achieves balanced bit error rate (BER) across all user mobility classes while delivering substantial peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) reductions relative to both conventional orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) and orthogonal time-frequency space (OTFS) modulation. The proposed framework is further validated in a four-user heterogeneous-mobility scenario, confirming its scalability and effectiveness to mixed-mobility multi-user scenarios.

RSMA-Assisted OFDM-OTFS Hybrid Framework for Mixed-Mobility Multiuser Systems

In future 6G vehicular networks, users employing orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) and orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) waveforms may coexist under diverse mobility conditions, where both can experience high-mobility and low-mobility profiles. Since OFDM users can suffer severe inter-carrier interference (ICI) and OTFS users occupy larger spectrum resources, rate-splitting multiple access (RSMA) is a flexible framework that can efficiently handle these heterogeneous aspects. In this work, we propose a novel RSMA-assisted system to provide downlink communication to multiple OFDM and OTFS users. A common stream comprising the common messages of OFDM users spans the whole bandwidth to help OFDM users manage the ICI induced by potential high Doppler effects. OTFS users do not participate in the common stream. The private streams of OFDM users and the streams of OTFS users are transmitted over disjoint frequency bands. During the SIC process implemented at all receivers, channel estimation errors are taken into account. The simulation results highlight the impact of the power allocation factors and channel estimation errors on the system performance, and demonstrate the superiority of the proposed framework over orthogonal multiplexing in terms of outage probability and rate performance.

Amplitude-Tunable Pinching Antenna Systems: Single-Mode Phase-Mismatch Radiation and Multiuser Beamforming

Pinching antenna systems (PASS) enable reconfigurable radiating elements and extended line-of-sight communication, mitigating path loss effects. However, existing designs lack fully controllable radiation weights, as they are governed by structural parameters rather than explicitly assigned variables. In this paper, we introduce a new degree of freedom (DoF) for PASS by enabling radiation weight control through phase-mismatch manipulation of guided waves under single-mode excitation within a coupled-mode framework. By tuning the propagation constants of pinching antennas, independent complex-weight control of individual elements is achieved, transforming PASS into a weight-adaptive analog beamforming architecture. Based on this principle, we present a physics-based hardware model that provides a unified framework for both amplitude-tunable pinching beamforming and conventional equal-power radiation models, ensuring compatibility with existing PASS implementations, such as movable setups. To evaluate the proposed model, we formulate a sum-rate maximization problem for hybrid precoding in multiuser downlink systems and solve it using an alternating optimization framework that combines weighted minimum mean square error-based digital precoding with genetic algorithm-based optimization of PASS configurations, including various scenarios such as weight tuning, antenna movability, and discrete activation. Numerical results demonstrate that the amplitude-tunable PASS architecture achieves consistent performance gains over conventional arrays and existing PASS schemes, with pronounced improvements in interference-limited regimes under practical constraints.

Spacing-Based Coupling Radiation Control in Pinching-Antennas Systems for Heterogeneous NOMA Users

Pinching-antennas systems (PASS) offer reconfigurable wireless channels via low-cost dielectric mediums by creating line-of-sight (LoS) communication links. Most of the existing PASS cover mechanisms of equal power pinching antennas for conventional bit-based communication, whereas flexible radiation control remains largely unexplored, particularly for heterogeneous semantic and bit users. In this paper, we investigate the performance of semantic communication (SC) using an adjustable radiation model over PASS, where the coupling strength between the dielectric waveguide and each pinching antenna is determined by the antenna-waveguide spacing. Specifically, the non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA)-assisted heterogeneous users are served by multiple pinching antennas using spacing-controlled adjustable radiation ratios. Uunder this setting, we maximize the semantic spectral efficiency (SE) subject to the bit-user quality of service (QoS) requirement, successive interference cancellation (SIC) feasibility, and the minimum adjacent antennas spacing constraint. An alternating optimization (AO) approach optimizes users power allocation and positions of pinching antennas. Simulations demonstrate the effectiveness of the proportional power PASS model in providing higher semantic SE in different geometrical and numerical settings compared to conventional benchmark schemes.

Waveguide to Meaning: Semantic-Aware NOMA for Pinching-Antenna Systems

We investigate the performance of the pinching-antenna systems (PASS) for semantic communication (SC) in both single-waveguide and multi-waveguide scenarios, under the constraints of bit-user quality of service (QoS) and bit-to-semantic decoding order in a heterogeneous users downlink non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA). Multiple pinching antennas in the single-waveguide scenario are at a minimum adjacent spacing required to prevent mutual coupling. An alternating optimization (AO)-based algorithm optimizes users power allocation coefficients and position of pinching antennas in the single-waveguide NOMA framework. For the multi-waveguide scenario, assuming adjacent waveguides at a sufficient lateral distance apart, the waveguides power allocation subproblem is solved using monotonic optimization and minorization-maximization (MM) approach. Specifically, a lower bound surrogate is iteratively maximized under the feasibility constraints such that a non-decreasing sequence of objective is obtained. Numerical results demonstrate that the NOMA based PASS exploiting SC offers higher semantic spectral efficiency (SE) while fulfilling the bit-user QoS requirement when compared to the considered conventional fixed antenna system. Notably, the multi-waveguide scenario becomes more beneficial for creating adjustable wireless channels in stringentconditions with higher bit-user QoS and wider coverage area requirements.

MIMO-AFDM Outperforms MIMO-OFDM in the Face of Hardware Impairments

The impact of both multiplicative and additive hardware impairments (HWIs) on multiple-input multiple-output affine frequency division multiplexing (MIMO-AFDM) systems is investigated. For small-scale MIMO-AFDM systems, a tight bit error rate (BER) upper bound associated with the maximum likelihood (ML) detector is derived. By contrast, for large-scale systems, a closed-form BER approximation associated with the linear minimum mean squared error (LMMSE) detector is presented, including realistic imperfect channel estimation scenarios. Our first key observation is that the full diversity order of a hardware-impaired AFDM system remains unaffected, which is a unique advantage. Furthermore, our analysis shows that 1) the BER results derived accurately predict the simulated ML performance in moderate-to-high signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs), while the theoretical BER curve of the LMMSE detector closely matches that of the Monte-Carlo based one. 2) MIMO-AFDM is more resilient to multiplicative distortions, such as phase noise and carrier frequency offset, compared to its orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) counterparts. This is attributed to its inherent chirp signal characteristics; 3) MIMO-AFDM consistently achieves superior BER performance compared to conventional MIMO-OFDM systems under the same additive HWI conditions, as well as different velocity values. The latter is because MIMO-AFDM is also resilient to the additional inter-carrier interference (ICI) imposed by the nonlinear distortions of additive HWIs. In a nutshell, compared to OFDM, AFDM demonstrates stronger ICI resilience and achieves the maximum full diversity attainable gain even under HWIs, thanks to its intrinsic chirp signalling structure as well as to the beneficial spreading effect of the discrete affine Fourier transform.

DMA-aided MU-MISO Systems for Power Splitting SWIPT via Lorentzian-Constrained Holography

This paper presents an optimal power splitting and beamforming design for co-located simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) users in Dynamic Metasurface Antenna (DMA)-aided multiuser multiple-input single-output (MISO) systems. The objective is to minimize transmit power while meeting users signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) and energy harvesting (EH) requirements. The problem is solved via an alternating optimization framework based on semidefinite programming (SDP), where metasurface tunability follows Lorentzian-constrained holography (LCH). In contrast to traditional beamforming architectures, DMA-assisted architectures reduce the need for RF chains and phase shifters but require optimization under the Lorentzian constraint limiting the amplitude and phase optimizations. Hence, the proposed method integrates several LCH schemes, including the recently proposed adaptive-radius LCH (ARLCH), and evaluates nonlinear EH models and circuit noise effects. Simulation results show that the proposed design significantly reduces transmit power compared with baseline methods, highlighting the efficiency of ARLCH and optimal power splitting in DMA-assisted SWIPT systems.

Non-Orthogonal AFDM: A Promising Spectrum-Efficient Waveform for 6G High-Mobility Communications

This paper proposes a spectrum-efficient nonorthogonal affine frequency division multiplexing (AFDM) waveform for reliable high-mobility communications in the upcoming sixth-generation (6G) mobile systems. Our core idea is to introduce a compression factor to enable controllable subcarrier overlapping in chirp-based AFDM modulation. To mitigate intercarrier interference (ICI), we introduce linear precoding at the transmitter and an iterative detection scheme at the receiver. Simulation results demonstrate that these techniques can effectively reduce interference and maintain robust bit error rate (BER) performance even under aggressive compression factors and high-mobility channel conditions. The proposed non-orthogonal AFDM waveform offers a promising solution for next-generation wireless networks, balancing spectrum efficiency and Doppler resilience in highly dynamic environments.

Semantic Communications in 6G: Coexistence, Multiple Access, and Satellite Networks

The exponential growth of wireless users and bandwidth constraints necessitates innovative communication paradigms for next-generation networks. Semantic Communication (SemCom) emerges as a promising solution by transmitting extracted meaning rather than raw bits, enhancing spectral efficiency and enabling intelligent resource allocation. This paper explores the integration of SemCom with conventional Bit-based Communication (BitCom) in heterogeneous networks, highlighting key challenges and opportunities. We analyze multiple access techniques, including Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access (NOMA), to support coexisting SemCom and BitCom users. Furthermore, we examine multi-modal SemCom frameworks for handling diverse data types and discuss their applications in satellite networks, where semantic techniques mitigate bandwidth limitations and harsh channel conditions. Finally, we identify future directions for deploying semantic-aware systems in 6G and beyond.