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Intelligent Reflecting Surface (IRS) assisted mmWave Wireless Communication Systems: A Survey

Nandan S. and M. Abdul Rahiman
LBS Institute of Technology for Women, APJ Abdul Kalam Technological University, Kerala, India

Abstract—Intelligent Reflecting Surface (IRS) is a promising technology for enhancing the coverage of millimeter wave (mmWave) based future wireless communication systems. Severe path loss and high directivity make mmWave transmission vulnerable to blockage. To overcome these issues, Intelligent Reflecting Surface (IRS) is introduced as a revolutionizing technology to provide better communication with the help of a virtual line-of-sight (LOS) link to bypass obstacles between transceivers through intelligent reflections. Significant performance improvement is achieved by smartly reconfiguring the wireless propagation environment using low-cost passive reflecting elements integrated on a planar surface. In this paper, we provide a survey of the IRS technology, its applications in mmWave wireless communication scenario, advantages over existing technologies, key design challenges, hardware architecture and the practical constraints while deployment. Furthermore, we highlight the relevant directions in future work.
 
Index Terms—IRS assisted mmWave systems, mmWave wireless communication, IRS hardware architecture, IRS reflection optimization, IRS channel estimation, passive beamforming, IRS deployment

Cite: Nandan S. and M. Abdul Rahiman, "Intelligent Reflecting Surface (IRS) assisted mmWave Wireless Communication Systems: A Survey," Journal of Communications vol. 17, no. 9, pp. 745-760, September 2022. Doi: 10.12720/jcm.17.9.745-760

Copyright © 2022 by the authors. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided that the article is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.