Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

With the remarkable growth in device diversity and data usage, the sixth generation (6G) wireless network will become extremely complex and crowded due to limited spectrum, increasing connection density, and diverse service demands. The critical challenge in 6G is how to intelligently support a large number of devices with limited resources. Thus, wireless communications require artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML) to make the current communication system smart and intelligent. The edge AI-empowered 6G wireless network provides a promising solution to realize connected intelligence via the cooperation of data processing, AI/ML, edge commutating and communication technologies. However, deploying edge AI systems in 6G can cause various issues in terms of latency, efficiency, accuracy, privacy and security. It is critical to design energy-efficient, intelligent and secure edge AI-empowered wireless networks to support diversified intelligent applications. The long-term goal of the proposed research program is to explore 6G wireless communication, edge computing and AI/ML technologies and overcome the challenges for the transformation and revolution of the current wireless network from `connected things' to intelligent emerging 6G `connected intelligence'. We aim to design energy-efficient, intelligent, and secure 6G networks by enabling data collection, processing, transmission and consumption at the network edge via developing AI/ML technologies, computation and communication technologies. To achieve this fundamental objective, the following short-term research objectives have been identified for the NSERC Discovery program: 1). Develop highly original wireless technologies for highly energy-efficient, low latency and massive connectivity communications 2). Develop highly trustworthy edge AI architecture through intelligent authentication and physical secure communications 3). Create novel service-driven and intelligent resource orchestration schemes for heterogeneous services in edge AI-empowered 6G. The proposed research program will help improve the efficiency, intelligence and security of the current wireless networks by integrating AI and communication systems for best supporting edge computing networks. Such network architecture is envisioned to be prototyped together with major Canadian wireless carriers (Bell, Telus Rogers, etc.). As an expected outcome of this research program, the proposed energy-efficient, intelligent and secure edge AI-empowered 6G network can facilitate the smart city implementation in Canada, where big cities like Toronto and Vancouver have already initiated efforts to. These research programs will bring interdisciplinary impacts to communication technologies, AI and data analytics. Meanwhile, the proposed technologies have strong potential to bring significant economic benefits to supporting organizations and into the Canadian communication technology market in the near future (5-10 years).