Working group Electronic Media: System Theory and Technology

The current emphasis of the research in the working group „Electronic Media: System Theory and Technology” lies on the extension of wireless broadband networks in order to be able to provide broadcast services over such networks. Following the invention, development, and evaluation (among others via field trials in France and Italy) of the system "Tower Overlay over LTE-A+ (TOoL+)", we concentrated our activities on FeMBMS (Further evolved Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service) as specified in Release 14 of 3GPP. With a view to the experience gained with TOoL+, we were able to promptly realise transmitter and receiver-prototypes for FeMBMS based on the software-defined radio (SDR) solution “IfN Generic SDR Toolkit (IGST)”. Currently, in a number of countries, field tests using the IfN components are under way and more are planned. In the context of the project 5G Media2Go we extended the solution such that it now supports 3GPP Release 16 („5G Broadcast“) and, together with many partner organizations, conduct research on its capabilities for mobile reception in cars. 3GPP still lacks a 5G Broadcast solution based on 5G New Radio. We are in the process of preparing a possible solution in the context of the R&D project 5G Reallabor in the region Braunschweig/Wolfsburg. We will evaluate the proposal via a field trial in this region. Another research activity aims at the integration of DVB-I(nternet) as the application layer for 5G Broadcast.