Researchers develop core network technology for 6G hyper-immersive services

Korean researchers have succeeded in developing a core wired network technology that enables remote conferences, collaborations, and surgeries in a 6G environment. This technology will open up a hyper-immersive metaverse world in the future 6G world.

The Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) has developed the key solutions required for hyper-immersive, high-precision services. The research team has developed a network stack technology tailored to the end-to-end network performance and successfully validated the technology by demonstrating a remote conference without delay.

The current network service transmission structure has limitations that prevent it from delivering the complex network performance required by application services, such as bandwidth and latency, with precision. ETRI has technologically overcome this challenge to bring forward the next generation of 6G.

The network stack technology developed by the research team provides high bandwidth performance of 100 Gbps (gigabits) per flow and high-precision performance of 1/100,000th of a second through collaboration between applications and networks.

The research team explained that the technology will be a key solution for 6G networks with a new transmission layer structure, where application services and networks cooperate with each other to optimize service transmission quality.

So far, the biggest barrier to commercializing technologies such as the metaverse and VR/AR has been securing guaranteed performance in latency. When users shift their gaze from the screen they are viewing, there must be no frame delay to ensure smooth transitions, preventing dizziness and allowing them to see the screen properly. However, the lack of guaranteed network latency performance has slowed the commercialization of related services.

ETRI believes that if this technology is commercialized, it will be possible to experience not only remote conferences, but also remote orchestral collaborations, remote surgery, remote robot and smart factory control, holograms, and real-time VR.

The research team successfully field-tested the technology on a 458-kilometer testbed network between Daejeon and Busan in conjunction with the National Information Society Agency (NIA)’s KOREN (KOrea advanced REsearch Network).

They explained that the core technologies applied in the testbed include:

• sophisticated packet scheduling technology in packet forwarding equipment
• performance-customized network stack technology in service terminals

In practice, they demonstrated 3D volumetric live remote conferencing over a testbed network between Daejeon and Busan. The presenter from the Packet Network Research Lab at ETRI Daejeon Headquarters and the presenter from the 3rd floor of the Nuri Hall at Pukyong National University in Busan showed the materials and explained them, and there was no delay at all.

The two men’s discussion unfolded naturally on the screen, like watching a 3D hologram. This successfully completed the transmission performance verification for high-quality end-to-end service.

The performance-customized programmable network stack developed by ETRI consists of two modules: a high-precision network (HPN) transport protocol module and a network operating system (NOS) stack.

This new transport networking stack can satisfy the diverse and complex quality of service (QoS) in 6G, which is expected to be commercialized after 2028, and can replace TCP-IP of the Internet.

It is expected that in the future, it will be widely used as services by being installed in terminal devices for:

• holographic hyper-immersive communication
• high-precision low-latency remote control
• real-time artificial intelligence-type services

The research team cited the following as major achievements:

• A method for mutual cooperation between applications and networks including a quality-guaranteed connection procedure;
• A method for service transmission considering delay performance;
• A method for optimizing traffic transmission considering application performance requirements;
• A method for guaranteeing programmable terminal network performance.

They explained that in relation to these achievements, 17 international and domestic patents, two SCIE-indexed papers in the field of high-precision networks, one excellent academic conference paper, and one international standard was adopted.

In particular, this performance-customized programmable networking stack technology won the top prize at the 6G Original Technology Festival held on October 17, 2024 at the 15th ICT Convergence International Conference (ICTC 2024), hosted by the Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences (KICS).

Cheung Tae Sik, the assistant vice president of ETRI’s Network Research Division, said, “In addition to the core technology for ultra-low latency and ultra-precision packet transmission for the 6G network, we have secured performance-customized end device network stack technology, which is a key solution that can realize end-to-end hyper-immersive and high-precision services in 6G.

“We have created an opportunity to lead the development and expansion of 6G ultra-precision services as well as the joint growth of the convergence industry.”

To commercialize this technology, the research team completed the transfer of ultra-low latency transport protocol technology to Kbell Co., Ltd., a domestic network solution company, in August 2024 and is currently supporting the development of a commercial prototype.

In addition, they plan to lead the upcoming 6G hyper-immersive, high-precision service market through technology transfer to network equipment companies and metaverse solution companies.