Towards a converged optical-wireless fronthaul/backhaul solution for 5G networks and beyond

This chapter discusses the cellular network interface and solution and presents a comprehensive discussion on the 5G enabling technologies. It introduces the concept of fiber-wireless network convergence. The chapter also presents a broad explanation of the radio-over-fiber transmission scheme. It describes optical transport network multiplexing schemes and considers wireless based transport networks. The chapter then presents experimental channel measurement and characterization. It focuses on centralized/cloud RAN (C-RAN) architectures due to their salient advantages such as cost-effectiveness, efficient centralized processing, better service provisioning, support for dynamic resource allocation and mobile traffic load balancing. The chapter considers C-RAN interfaces such as mobile backhaul (MBH) and mobile fronthaul (MFH). It also discusses the associated radio interface that can be employed for the in-phase and quadrature data transmission between central units and distributed units. MBH/MFH transport network provisioning is largely based on optical fiber solutions.