Analysis of 5G Channel Access for Collaboration with TSN Concluding at a 5G Scheduling Mechanism

Abstract

As 5G enters the application field of industrial communications, compatibility with technologies of wired deterministic communications such as Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) needs to be considered during the standardization process. While consideration of underlying integration architectures and basic resource mapping are already part of the standard, necessary traffic forwarding schemes are currently planned to be deployed in additional interfaces located at the edge of a 5G System. This analysis highlights the extent to which internal 5G mechanisms can be used to execute the traffic forwarding of TSN streams according to the requirements of the TSN control plane. It concludes with the recognition that a static prioritization of logical channels is not appropriate for the treatment of TSN streams over the 5G air interface. A novel prioritization mechanism of logical data channels is derived, which enables the execution of TSN-compliant traffic shaping over 5G RAN. Subsequently, a proof of concept is implemented and simulated for evaluation.