Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) is a key technology for enabling a wide range of applications in future wireless systems. However, the sensing performance is often degraded by model mismatches caused by geometric errors (e.g., position and orientation) and hardware impairments (e.g., mutual coupling and amplifier non-linearity). This paper focuses on the angle estimation performance with antenna arrays and tackles the critical challenge of array beam pattern calibration for ISAC systems. To assess calibration quality from a sensing perspective, a novel performance metric that accounts for angle estimation error, rather than beam pattern similarity, is proposed and incorporated into a differentiable loss function. Additionally, a cooperative calibration framework is introduced, allowing multiple user equipments to iteratively optimize the beam pattern based on the proposed loss functions and local data, and collaboratively update global calibration parameters. The proposed models and algorithms are validated using real-world beam pattern measurements collected in an anechoic chamber. Experimental results show that the angle estimation error can be reduced from 1.01◦ to 0.11◦ in 2D calibration scenarios, and from 5.19◦ to 0.86◦ in 3D calibration scenarios.

Radio-based simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) has the potential to provide precise user equipment (UE) localization and environmental sensing capabilities by exploiting radio signals. Most existing approaches leverage line-of-sight (LoS) and single-bounce non-line-of-sight (NLoS) paths solely, while higher-order NLoS paths are treated as disturbance. In this paper, we investigate the benefits of leveraging double-bounce NLoS paths for solving the bistatic snapshot radio SLAM problem.We derive the Cramér-Rao bound (CRB) for joint estimation of the UE state and landmark positions when double-bounce NLoS paths are present. In addition, we propose an algorithm to identify double-bounce NLoS paths and leverage them into joint UE and landmarks estimation. The derived bounds are validated through simulated data, and the proposed algorithms are evaluated using experimental millimeter wave (mmWave) measurements harnessing beamformed 5G cellular reference signals. The numerical and experimental results demonstrate that the double-bounce NLoS paths which share at least one incidence point (IP) with the single-bounce NLoS paths improve the estimation accuracy of the UE state and existing IPs of single-bounce NLoS paths. Importantly, exploiting double-bounce NLoS paths enhances environmental mapping capabilities by revealing landmarks that are unobservable with single-bounce NLoS paths alone.

Distributed integrated sensing and communication (DISAC) systems are key enablers for 6G networks, offering the capability to jointly track multiple targets using spatially distributed base stations (BSs). A fundamental challenge in DISAC is the seamless and efficient handover of target tracks between BSs with partially overlapping fields of view, especially in dense and dynamic environments. In this paper, we propose a novel target handover framework based on belief propagation (BP) for multi-target tracking in DISAC systems. By representing the probabilistic data association and tracking problem through a factor graph, the proposed method enables efficient marginal inference with reduced computational complexity. Our framework introduces a principled handover criterion and message-passing strategy that minimizes inter-BS communication while maintaining tracking continuity and accuracy. We demonstrate that the proposed handover procedure achieves performance comparable to centralized processing, yet significantly reduces data exchange and processing overhead. Extensive simulations validate the robustness of the approach in urban tracking scenarios with closely spaced targets.

Integrated sensing and communication enables simultaneous communication and sensing tasks, including precise radio positioning and mapping, essential for future 6G networks. Current methods typically model environmental landmarks as isolated incidence points or small reflection areas, lacking detailed attributes essential for advanced environmental interpretation. This paper addresses these limitations by developing an end-to-end cooperative uplink framework involving multiple base stations and users. Our method uniquely estimates extended landmark objects and incorporates obstruction-based outlier removal to mitigate multi-bounce signal effects. Validation using realistic ray-tracing data demonstrates substantial improvements in the richness of the estimated environmental map.

The concept of 6G distributed integrated sensing and communications (DISAC) builds upon the functionality of integrated sensing and communications (ISAC) by integrating distributed architectures, significantly enhancing both sensing and communication coverage and performance. In 6G DISAC systems, tracking target trajectories requires base stations (BSs) to hand over their tracked targets to neighboring BSs. Determining what information to share, where, how, and when is critical to effective handover. This paper addresses the target handover challenge in DISAC systems and introduces a method enabling BSs to share essential target trajectory information at appropriate time steps, facilitating seamless handovers to other BSs. The target tracking problem is tackled using the standard trajectory Poisson multi-Bernoulli mixture (TPMBM) filter, enhanced with the proposed handover algorithm. Simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the implemented tracking solution.

Sidelink positioning research predominantly focuses on the snapshot positioning problem, often within the mmWave band. Only a limited number of studies have delved into vehicle-to-anything (V2X) tracking within sub-6 GHz bands. In this paper, we investigate the V2X sidelink tracking challenges over sub-6 GHz frequencies. We propose a Kalman-filter-based tracking approach that leverages the estimated error covariance lower bounds (EECLBs) as measurement covariance, alongside a gating method to augment tracking performance. Through simulations employing ray-tracing data and super-resolution channel parameter estimation, we validate the feasibility of sidelink tracking using our proposed tracking filter with two novel EECLBs. Additionally, we demonstrate the efficacy of the gating method in identifying line-of-sight paths and enhancing tracking performance.

High-frequency communication systems bring extremely large aperture arrays (ELAA) and large bandwidths, integrating localization and (bi-static) sensing functions without extra infrastructure. Such systems are likely to operate in the near-field (NF), where the performance of localization and sensing is degraded if a simplified far-field channel model is considered. However, when taking advantage of the additional geometry information in the NF, e.g., the encapsulated information in the wavefront, localization and sensing performance can be improved. In this work, we formulate a joint synchronization, localization, and sensing problem in the NF. Considering the array size could be much larger than an obstacle, the effect of partial blockage (i.e., a portion of antennas are blocked) is investigated, and a blockage detection algorithm is proposed. The simulation results show that blockage greatly impacts performance for certain positions, and the proposed blockage detection algorithm can mitigate this impact by identifying the blocked antennas.

In this paper, we investigate sub-6 GHz V2X sidelink positioning scenarios in 5G vehicular networks through a comprehensive end-to-end methodology encompassing ray-tracing-based channel modeling, novel theoretical performance bounds, high-resolution channel parameter estimation, and geometric positioning using a round-trip-time (RTT) protocol. We first derive a novel, approximate Cramér-Rao bound (CRB) on the connected road user (CRU) position, explicitly taking into account multipath interference, path merging, and the RTT protocol. Capitalizing on tensor decomposition and ESPRIT methods, we propose high-resolution channel parameter estimation algorithms specifically tailored to dense multipath V2X sidelink environments, designed to detect multipath components (MPCs) and extract line-of-sight (LoS) parameters. Finally, using realistic ray-tracing data and antenna patterns, comprehensive simulations are conducted to evaluate channel estimation and positioning performance, indicating that sub-meter accuracy can be achieved in sub-6 GHz V2X with the proposed algorithms.

In this article, we address the timely topic of cellular bistatic simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) with specific focus on end-to-end processing solutions, from raw I/Q samples, via channel parameter estimation to user equipment (UE) and landmark location information in millimeter-wave (mmWave) networks, with minimal prior knowledge. Firstly, we propose a new multipath channel parameter estimation solution that operates directly with beam reference signal received power (BRSRP) measurements, alleviating the need to know the true antenna beampatterns or the underlying beamforming weights. Additionally, the method has built-in robustness against unavoidable antenna sidelobes. Secondly, we propose new snapshot SLAM algorithms that have increased robustness and identifiability compared to prior art, in practical built environments with complex clutter and multi-bounce propagation scenarios, and do not rely on any a priori motion model. The performance of the proposed methods is assessed at the 60GHz mmWave band, via both realistic ray-tracing evaluations as well as true experimental measurements, in an indoor environment. A wide set of offered results demonstrate the improved performance, compared to the relevant prior art, in terms of the channel parameter estimation as well as the end-to-end SLAM performance. Finally, the article provides the measured 60GHz data openly available for the research community, facilitating results reproducibility as well as further algorithm development.

One of the most fundamental problems in simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) is the ability to take into account data association (DA) uncertainties. In this paper, this problem is addressed by proposing a multi-hypotheses sampling distribution for particle filtering-based SLAM algorithms. By modeling the measurements and landmarks as random finite sets, an importance density approximation that incorporates DA uncertainties is derived. Then, a tractable Gaussian mixture model approximation of the multi-hypotheses importance density is proposed in which each mixture component represents a different DA. Finally, an iterative method for approximating the mixture components of the sampling distribution is utilized and a partitioned update strategy is developed. Using synthetic and experimental data, it is demonstrated that the proposed importance density improves the accuracy and robustness of landmark-based SLAM in cluttered scenarios over state-of-the-art methods. At the same time, the partitioned update strategy makes it possible to include multiple DA hypotheses in the importance density approximation, leading to a favorable linear complexity scaling, in terms of the number of landmarks in the field-of-view.

In the upcoming sixth generation (6G) of wireless communication systems, reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) are regarded as one of the promising technological enablers, which can provide programmable signal propagation. Therefore, simultaneous radio localization and mapping (SLAM) with RISs appears as an emerging research direction within the 6G ecosystem. In this paper, we propose a novel framework of RIS-enabled radio SLAM for wireless operation without the intervention of access points (APs). We first design the RIS phase profiles leveraging prior information for the user equipment (UE), such that they uniformly illuminate the angular sector where the UE is probabilistically located. Second, we modify the marginal Poisson multi-Bernoulli SLAM filter and estimate the UE state and landmarks, which enables efficient mapping of the radio propagation environment. Third, we derive the theoretical Cramér-Rao lower bounds on the estimators for the channel parameters and the UE state. We finally evaluate the performance of the proposed method under scenarios with a limited number of transmissions, taking into account the channel coherence time. Our results demonstrate that the RIS enables solving the radio SLAM problem with zero APs, and that the consideration of the Doppler shift contributes to improving the UE speed estimates.

Millimeter-wave (mmWave) signals provide attractive opportunities for sensing due to their inherent geometrical connections to physical propagation channels. Two common modalities used in mmWave sensing are monostatic and bistatic sensing, which are usually considered separately. By integrating these two modalities, information can be shared between them, leading to improved sensing performance. In this paper, we investigate the integration of monostatic and bistatic sensing in a 5G mmWave scenario, implement the extended Kalman-Poisson multi-Bernoulli sequential filters to solve the sensing problems, and propose a method to periodically fuse user states and maps from two sensing modalities.

We investigate the problem of low-complexity, high-dimensional channel estimation with beamspace observations, for the purpose of localization. Existing work on beamspace ESPRIT (estimation of signal parameters via rotational invariance technique) approaches requires either a shift-invariance structure of the transformation matrix, or a full-column rank condition. We extend these beamspace ESPRIT methods to a case when neither of these conditions is satisfied, by exploiting the full-row rank of the transformation matrix. We first develop a tensor decomposition-based approach, and further design a matrix-based ESPRIT method to achieve auto-pairing of the channel parameters, with reduced complexity. Numerical simulations show that the proposed methods work in the challenging scenario, and the matrix-based ESPRIT approach achieves better performance than the tensor ESPRIT method.

Networks in 5G and beyond utilize millimeter wave (mmWave) radio signals, large bandwidths, and large antenna arrays, which bring opportunities in jointly localizing the user equipment and mapping the propagation environment, termed as simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). Existing approaches mainly rely on delays and angles, and ignore the Doppler, although it contains geometric information. In this paper, we study the benefits of exploiting Doppler in SLAM through deriving the posterior Cramér-Rao bounds (PCRBs) and formulating the extended Kalman-Poisson multi-Bernoulli sequential filtering solution with Doppler as one of the involved measurements. Both theoretical PCRB analysis and simulation results demonstrate the efficacy of utilizing Doppler.

Radio localization is a key enabler for joint communication and sensing in the fifth/sixth generation (5G/6G) communication systems. With the help of multipath components (MPCs), localization and mapping tasks can be done with a single base station (BS) and single unsynchronized user equipment (UE) if both of them are equipped with an antenna array. However, the antenna array at the UE side increases the hardware and computational cost, preventing localization functionality. In this work, we show that with Doppler estimation and MPCs, localization and mapping tasks can be performed even with a single-antenna mobile UE. Furthermore, we show that the localization and mapping performance will improve and then saturate at a certain level with an increased UE speed. Both theoretical Cramér-Rao bound analysis and simulation results show the potential of localization under mobility and the effectiveness of the proposed localization algorithm.

5G millimeter wave (mmWave) signals have inherent geometric connections to the propagation channel and the propagation environment. Thus, they can be used to jointly localize the receiver and map the propagation environment, which is termed as simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). One of the most important tasks in the 5G SLAM is to deal with the nonlinearity of the measurement model. To solve this problem, existing 5G SLAM approaches rely on sigma-point or extended Kalman filters, linearizing the measurement function with respect to the prior probability density function (PDF). In this paper, we study the linearization of the measurement function with respect to the posterior PDF, and implement the iterated posterior linearization filter into the Poisson multi-Bernoulli SLAM filter. Simulation results demonstrate the accuracy and precision improvements of the resulting SLAM filter.

Millimeter wave (mmWave) signals are useful for simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), due to their inherent geometric connection to the propagation environment and the propagation channel. To solve the SLAM problem, existing approaches rely on sigma-point or particle-based approximations, leading to high computational complexity, precluding real-time execution. We propose a novel low-complexity SLAM filter, based on the Poisson multi-Bernoulli mixture (PMBM) filter. It utilizes the extended Kalman (EK) first-order Taylor series based Gaussian approximation of the filtering distribution, and applies the track-oriented marginal multi-Bernoulli/Poisson (TOMB/P) algorithm to approximate the resulting PMBM as a Poisson multi-Bernoulli (PMB). The filter can account for different landmark types in radio SLAM and multiple data association hypotheses. Hence, it has an adjustable complexity/performance trade-off. Simulation results show that the developed SLAM filter can greatly reduce the computational cost, while it keeps the good performance of mapping and user state estimation.

Simultaneous localization and communication (SLAC) is a desirable feature of 5G and beyond 5G wireless networks. To be able to implement SLAC, efficient high dimensional channel estimation methods are critical. This work presents a low-complexity multidimensional channel parameter estimation via rotational invariance techniques (MD-ESPRIT). We use both the spatial smoothing and forward-backward averaging techniques to further explore data samples to extract multipath components (MPCs). We propose a one-dimensional Fast-Fourier-Transform- (FFT) and inverse-FFT-based approach to obtain the signal subspaces for angular frequency estimation. The geometry relationship between MPCs and positions is utilized for simultaneous positioning and mapping. Numerical results demonstrate the improved identifiability and low complexity performance of the proposed scheme.

5G millimeter wave (mmWave) signals can be used to jointly localize the receiver and map the propagation environment in vehicular networks, which is a typical simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) problem. Mapping the environment is challenging, due to measurements comprising both specular and diffuse multipath components, where diffuse multipath is usually considered as a perturbation. We here propose a novel method to utilize all available multipath signals from each landmark for mapping and incorporate this into a Poisson multi-Bernoulli mixture for the 5G SLAM problem. Simulation results demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed scheme.