Low-Latency Wireless Communications for Real-Time Machine Control

Abstract

With the proposal of URLLC communication within 5G standardization, running control loops in real time over wireless networks becomes reachable. However, in addition to adaptations in higher protocol layers, the support for low latency communications requires significant changes in the employed frame structure and waveform of the physical layer. In this setup, we demonstrate a wireless low-latency communication system which supports end-to-end latencies of 2ms, where 50us are spent on the physical layer. To achieve that goal we employ 5G-similar GFDM modulation with extremely short packets of 20us each. The system is used to perform real-time control of a self-balancing robot.