Stacked intelligent metasurface (SIM) extends the concept of single-layer reconfigurable holographic surfaces (RHS) by incorporating a multi-layered structure, thereby providing enhanced control over electromagnetic wave propagation and improved signal processing capabilities. This study investigates the potential of SIM in enhancing the rate fairness in multiuser downlink systems by addressing two key optimization problems: maximizing the minimum rate (MR) and maximizing the geometric mean of rates (GMR). The former strives to enhance the minimum user rate, thereby ensuring fairness among users, while the latter relaxes fairness requirements to strike a better trade-off between user fairness and system sum-rate (SR). For the MR maximization, we adopt a consensus alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM)-based approach, which decomposes the approximated problem into sub-problems with closed-form solutions. For GMR maximization, we develop an alternating optimization (AO)-based algorithm that also yields closed-form solutions and can be seamlessly adapted for SR maximization. Numerical results validate the effectiveness and convergence of the proposed algorithms. Comparative evaluations show that MR maximization ensures near-perfect fairness, while GMR maximization balances fairness and system SR. Furthermore, the two proposed algorithms respectively outperform existing related works in terms of MR and SR performance. Lastly, SIM with lower power consumption achieves performance comparable to that of multi-antenna digital beamforming.

This paper investigates the downlink of an internet-of-things (IoT) network with a base station serving multiple IoT devices (IoTDs) with the assistance of two far-apart reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs). We propose joint design of the BS’s beamformer and RISs’ quantized programmable reflecting elements (PREs). Considering the IoTDs’ minimum rate (MR) as the primary optimization objective, we further aim to optimize the multi-objective function of both the MR and sum rate (SR) in the Pareto-optimal sense. We develop convex-solver and closed-form algorithms. Simulations demonstrate that the latter, with scalable complexity, performs as well as the former, which exhibits polynomially increasing complexity. Furthermore, the simulations reveal the advantages of the double-RIS assisted solution over its single-RIS assisted counterpart of the same size.

Weakly Supervised Semantic Segmentation (WSSS) with image-level labels reduces reliance on pixel-level annotations for remote sensing (RS) imagery. However, in natural scenes, WSSS frequently faces challenges such as imprecise localization, extraneous activations, and class ambiguity. These challenges are particularly pronounced in RS images, characterized by complex backgrounds, substantial scale variations, and dense small-object distributions, complicating the distinction between intra-class variations and inter-class similarities. To tackle these challenges, we introduce a class-constrained multi-modal attention framework aimed at enhancing the localization accuracy of class activation maps (CAMs). Specifically, we design class-specific tokens to capture the visual characteristics of each target class. As these tokens initially lack explicit constraints, we integrate the textual branch of the RemoteCLIP model to leverage class-related linguistic priors, which collaborate with visual features to encode the specific semantics of diverse objects. Furthermore, the multi-modal collaborative optimization module dynamically establishes tailored attention mechanisms for both global and regional features, thereby improving class discriminability among targets to mitigate challenges like inter-class similarity and dense small-object distributions. By refining class-specific attention, textual semantic attention, and patch-level pairwise affinity weights, the quality of generated pseudo-masks is markedly enhanced. Concurrently, to ensure domain-invariant feature learning, we align the backbone features with the CLIP visual embedding by minimizing the distribution disparity between the two in the latent space, semantic consistency is therefore preserved. The experimental results validate the effectiveness and robustness of our proposed method, achieving significant performance improvements on two representative RS WSSS datasets.

This is the first investigation focused on delivering multi-stream information to multiple multi-antenna users employing an active reconfigurable intelligent surface (aRIS)-assisted system. We conceive the joint design of the transmit precoders and of the aRIS’s power-amplified reconfigurable elements (APRES) to enhance the log-det rate objective functions for all users, which poses large-scale mixed discrete continuous problems. We develop a max-min log-det solver, which iterates quadratic-solvers of cubic complexity to maximize the nonsmooth function representing the minimum of the users’ log-det rate functions. To mitigate the computational burden associated with cubically escalating complexity in large-scale scenarios, we introduce a pair of alternative problems aimed at maximizing the smooth functions representing the sum of the users’ log-det rate function (sum log-det) and the soft minimum of the users’ log-det rate function (soft min log-det). We develop sum log-det and soft max-min solvers, leveraging closed-form expressions of scalable (linear) complexity for efficient computation. This approach ensures practicality in addressing large-scale scenarios. Furthermore, the soft min log-det enables us to enhance the log-det rates for all users and their sum, ultimately improving the quality of delivering multi-user multi-stream information.

This paper considers a scenario involving a network where two reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) contribute to enhancing the security of multi-user secure downlink communication, even in the presence of multiple potential eavesdroppers. The objective is to optimize the base station (BS)’s beamforming and the quantized programmable reflecting elements (PREs) of both RISs to maximize the geometric mean of secrecy rates (GM-SECR). To tackle this intricate non-convex penalized optimization problem, the paper introduces an alternating descent iteration algorithm based on closed-form solutions. Through simulations, the study highlights the advantages presented by the proposed double-RIS system and validates the efficacy of the algorithm. Notably, the results demonstrate a marked enhancement in achieving fair distributions of secrecy rates.

This paper considers hybrid beamforming consisting of analog beamforming (ABF) coupled with digital baseband beamforming (DBF) which is designed for multi-user (MU) multiple input multiple output (MIMO) millimeter-wave (mmWave) communications. ABF uses a limited number of radio frequency (RF) chains and finite-resolution phase-shifters to alleviate the power consumption at the base station (BS), while DBF uses either zero-forcing beamforming (ZFB) or regularized zero forcing beamforming (RZFB) to restrain MU interference. The joint design of ABF and DBF constitutes a computationally challenging mixed discrete continuous optimization problem. The paper develops efficient algorithms for its solution, which iterate scalable-complex expressions. Furthermore, we conceive a new class of MU RZFB for attaining higher rates. Simulations are provided to demonstrate the viability of the proposed algorithms and the advantages of the conceived RZFB.

This paper considers a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-aided network, which relies on a multiple antenna array aided base station (BS) and an RIS for serving multiple single antenna downlink users. To provide reliable links to all users over the same bandwidth and same time-slot, the paper proposes the joint design of linear transmit beamformers and the programmable reflecting coefficients of an RIS to maximize the geometric mean (GM) of the users’ rates. A new computationally efficient alternating descent algorithm is developed, which is based on closed-forms only for generating improved feasible points of this nonconvex problem. We also consider the joint design of widely linear transmit beamformers and the programmable reflecting coefficients to further improve the GM of the users’ rates. Hence another alternating descent algorithm is developed for its solution, which is also based on closed forms only for generating improved feasible points. Numerical examples are provided to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed approach.

This paper considers a network of a multi-antenna array base station (BS) and a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) to deliver both information to information users (IUs) and power to energy users (EUs). The RIS links the connection between the IUs and the BS as there is no direct path between the former and the latter. The EUs are located nearby the BS in order to effectively harvest energy from the high-power signal from the BS, while the much weaker signal reflected from the RIS hardly contributes to the EUs’ harvested energy. To provide reliable links for all users over the same time-slot, we adopt the transmit time-switching (transmit-TS) approach, under which information and energy are delivered over different time-slot fractions. This allows us to rely on conjugate beamforming for energy links and zero-forcing/regularized zero-forcing beamforming (ZFB/RZFB) and on the programmable reflecting coefficients (PRCs) of the RIS for information links. We show that ZFB/RZFB and PRCs can be still separately optimized in their joint design, where PRC optimization is based on iterative closed-form expressions. We then develop a path-following algorithm for solving the max-min IU throughput optimization problem subject to a realistic constraint on the quality-of-energy-service in terms of the EUs’ harvested energy thresholds. We also propose a new RZFB for substantially improving the IUs’ throughput.

This paper considers a network consisting of a multiple antenna array access point serving multiple single antenna downlink users with the assistance of a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS). The reflecting coefficients of the RIS can be programmed to ensure that the signals reflected from the RIS elements add coherently at the users. The joint design of these programmable reflecting coefficients and transmit beamforming to maximize the users' worst rate is addressed. Under either proper Gaussian signaling (PGS) or improper Gaussian signaling (IGS), the design poses a very computationally challenging nonconvex problem. Based on their exactly penalized optimization reformulation, which incorporates the computationally intractable unit-modulus constraints on the reflecting coefficients into the optimization objectives, new iterative algorithms of low computational complexity, which converge at least to a locally optimal solution, are developed. The provided simulations show not only the benefit of using the RIS, but also the advantage of IGS over PGS in delivering higher rates to users.

The paper considers the problem of beamforming design for a multi-cell network of downlink users, who either harvest energy or decode information or do both by receiving signals from the multi-antenna base station (BS) within a time slot and over the same frequency band. Our previous contributions have showed that the time-fraction based energy and information transmission, under which first the energy is transferred within the initial fraction of time and then the information is transferred within the remaining fraction, is the most efficient design alternative both in terms of its practical implementation and network performance. However, at the time of writing, both energy and information beamforming has only been implemented for proper Gaussian signaling (PGS), which has limited the network's throughput. Although the network throughput could be improved in some specific scenarios by using non-orthogonal multi-access (NOMA), this may compromise the user secrecy. In order to circumvent the above implementations, we conceive improper Gaussian signaling (IGS) for information beamforming, which enables the network to substantially improve its throughput in any scenario without jeopardizing the user secrecy despite its low-complexity signal processing at the user end. A simpler subclass of IGS is also considered, which also outperforms NOMA PGS and works under any arbitrary scenario.

Internet-of-things (IoT) applications continue to drive advancements in serving as many heterogeneous low-latency downlinks and uplinks as possible within a constrained communication bandwidth. Full-duplexing (FD) transceivers have been introduced to implement simultaneous signal transmission and reception (STR) over the entire available frequency band. However, both inter-link interference and FD loop-interference are hardly suppressed to a necessary level for the effectiveness of FD-based STR even for microcells. This paper proposes an alternative STR technique per one time-slot for macrocells, where a fraction of a time-slot is used for downlinks and the remaining complementary fraction of the time-slot is used for uplinks. Thus, STR over the entire available bandwidth can be implemented in a way with no loop interference. Furthermore, another approach of using a fraction of the available bandwidth for downlinks and the remaining complementary fraction of the bandwidth for uplinks over the whole time-slot is also proposed. The problem of both downlink and uplink beamforming to maximize the energy efficiency of such heterogeneous networks subject to the quality-of-service in terms of downlink and uplink throughput is examined for all three possible STRs. Numerical results demonstrate the advantages of the time-fraction-wise STR and bandwidth-fraction-wise STR over the FD-based STR, where the time-fraction-wise STR is not only the best in serving the same numbers of downlinks and uplinks but also is capable of serving many more downlinks and uplinks with a higher energy efficiency.