The IEEE Communications Standards Magazine aims to be a platform for presenting and discussing a broad variety of standards-related topics in the area of communications. This quarterly magazine will cover areas of communication and networking standards, as well as the role of standards in technical innovation in communications, the effect of intellectual property on communication technology standardization, and research on standardization methodologies in communications. Contributions are encouraged from areas and disciplines that impact the development, adoption, and impact of communications standards on industry and society, such as standards development processes, economics of standards, and the role of national and international policies and regulations on standardization.

Co-Sponsors: IEEE VTS and IEEE Standards Association
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Special Issue on Ambient Internet of Things
Submission Date: 2025-01-01

The Internet of Things (IoT) has experienced exponential growth in recent years, with billions of IoT connections currently in use. This trend is expected to continue with connections projected to reach tens of billions in the coming years. However, this rapid growth presents significant challenges, mainly because legacy IoT devices rely on batteries that require replacement or manual recharging. Replacing or recharging these batteries can be highly challenging and costly, particularly in large-scale deployments, and raises serious sustainability and environmental concerns due to the required battery replacements.

Against this backdrop, Ambient IoT is emerging as a promising alternative to traditional battery-powered IoT devices. Ambient IoT devices operate with limited or no power storage at all and are powered by ambient power sources, such as RF signals, solar power, indoor light, vibrations, and heat. The benefits of Ambient IoT include: (a) maintenance-free operation, significantly reducing maintenance costs; (b) suitability for deployment in scenarios that may not be accessible after installation, including extreme environmental conditions like high pressure and high temperatures; (c) allows for small and low cost “printable” tags; and (d) improved sustainability with minimal environmental impact. 

Ambient IoT use cases are typically grouped into four main categories: inventory, sensors, command, and positioning. While some of these use cases have been traditionally served by RFID technologies, this Special Issue (SI) is targeted to offer improved range and higher capacity compared to RFID, making it a better option for a wider array of applications. Ambient IoT is currently under active study in global standardization organizations, such as 3GPP and IEEE, with potential specifications expected as early as next year. Furthermore, Bluetooth technology, in particular Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), is emerging as one of the key enablers of Ambient IoT use cases, as some IoT solution providers already rely on Bluetooth to support applications utilizing energy harvesting devices. Additionally, numerous ongoing research and prototyping efforts in academia and industry are exploring the further improvement of battery-less technologies to realize the Internet of Everything.

Motivated by recent advancements and ongoing standardization efforts in Ambient IoT, this SI invites high-quality papers in, but not limited to, the following areas:

    Ambient IoT standardization efforts in standardization forums (3GPP, IEEE, Bluetooth SIG, etc.).
    Future perspectives on Ambient IoT evolution within standardization forums.
    Device architectures tailored for Ambient IoT.
    Power saving solutions for Ambient IoT.
    Low-complexity and low-power reception and transmission techniques for Ambient IoT.
    Energy harvesting techniques for Ambient IoT.
    Energy storage solutions for Ambient IoT.
    Prototyping and experimental validation of Ambient IoT.
    Regulatory, spectrum, and coexistence considerations for Ambient IoT.
    Comparison of Ambient IoT with legacy IoT technologies.
    Coverage analysis and coverage enhancement techniques for Ambient IoT.
    Low-complexity physical layer design, including waveform, modulation, and channel coding design.
    Design of physical layer channels and signals for Ambient IoT.
    Synchronization and timing aspects of Ambient IoT.
    Random access and multiple access techniques for Ambient IoT.
    Characteristics, control, and design of carrier wave waveform for backscattering and RF energy harvesting.
    Interference analysis and interference cancellation techniques for Ambient IoT.
    Design of compact higher-layer protocols and functionalities for Ambient IoT.
    RAN architecture and core network aspects of Ambient IoT.
    Security aspects of Ambient IoT.
    Positioning/tracking techniques and functionalities for Ambient IoT.
    Use cases, traffic patterns, and deployment aspects of Ambient IoT.
    AI/machine learning enabled Ambient IoT.
    Device and data management and commercialization aspects for Ambient IoT.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. Select "June 2025/Ambient IoT" from the drop-down menu of Topic/Series titles.

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 1 January 2025
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 1 February 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 March 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 1 April 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 15 April 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 30 April 2025
Expected Publication Date:  June 2025

Guest Editors

Sandeep Narayanan Kadan Veedu
Ericsson Research, Sweden

Yuchul Kim
Qualcomm Inc., USA

Thiemo Voigt
Uppsala University, Sweden 

Special Issue on Integrated Terrestrial and Non-Terrestrial Networks
Submission Date: 2025-01-01

In Release 17, the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) initiated the standardization process for Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN) to enable 5G-based Terrestrial Networks (TN) to support NTN. This release outlines that NTN will encompass satellites and identifies Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and High-Altitude Platforms (HAPs) as special use cases. In Release 17, 3GPP introduced a set of basic features to enable 5G NR operation over NTN in FR1, i.e., up to 7.125 GHz. In the ongoing Release 18, it is expected that 5G NR NTN operations will be enhanced by improving coverage for handheld terminals as well as addressing mobility and service continuity between TN and NTN. A key advantage of NTN is their extensive coverage capability. However, the integration of NTN into TN introduces various technical challenges. Unlike stationary base stations in TNs, some use cases of NTNs utilize satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) that move at considerable speeds, introducing challenges like Doppler shift and trajectory-dependent frequency variations. Compensating for these shifts and ensuring user equipment is aware of satellite mobility patterns becomes crucial. Additionally, the extended signal path through the atmosphere results in higher path loss, impacting network performance in terms of latency and capacity. Moreover, such networks are expected to coexist in the spectrum, necessitating efficient dynamic spectrum access strategies, efficient spectrum reuse mechanism and spectrum co-channeling. Furthermore, this seamless integration highly depends on efficient wireless fronthaul and backhaul solutions. Therefore, this Special Issue (SI) aims to provide a compendium of technical papers and vision-setting articles from academia, industry, and standardization activities, focusing on major disruptive trends related to integrated TN and NTN.

Motivated by current trends in the field of integrated TN and NTN, we seek to assemble cross-cutting and high-quality original research papers in the following areas, but not limited to:

    Beamforming techniques for energy efficient integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Multiple access schemes, e.g., RSMA, NOMA for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Backscatter communications for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Mobility and handover management for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Adaptive protocol and QoS for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    AI for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Energy harvesting, wireless information, and power transfer for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Intelligent reflecting surface design for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Holographic MIMO for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    PHY algorithms and protocol designs for integrated TN-NTN.
    Cost and power efficient design of integrated TN-NTN networks.
    Wireless fronthaul and backhaul solutions for integrated TN-NTN networks.
    AI backed security, privacy, and interference exploitation challenges in integrated TN-NTN based systems.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. The timetable is as follows:

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 1 January 2025 (Extended Deadline) 
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 1 February 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 March 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 15 April 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 April 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 May 2025
Expected Publication Date: September 2025

Guest Editors

Muhammad Ali Jamshed
University of Glasgow, UK

Aryan Kaushik
University of Sussex, UK

Eva Lagunas
University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg

Malte Schellmann
Huawei Munich Research Center, Germany

Miguel A. Dajer
Futurewei Technologies, USA

Special Issue on Self-Organizing Networks: Opportunities, Challenges, and Applications
Submission Date: 2025-01-01

The network management automation problem in 6G systems has been gaining attention from both the standardization organizations and researchers. The current age of agile and dynamic cloud-based environment demands autonomous systems for managing network resources. The goal of operators is to optimize the network resources in order to achieve minimalism with efficiency. The Self-Organizing Networks is the next leap of evolution that is capable of going beyond automation capabilities. With Self-Organizing Networks, it is not just making the network capable of managing resources, but rather making the network learn and adapt itself with respect to the dynamic environment. In networks, the autonomous tasks refer to self-healing, self-diagnosing, and self-provisioning. With the help of emerging technologies, such as Quantum Computing, Artificial intelligence (AI), Generative AI, Internet of Things (IoT), and Blockchain, autonomous tasks can be realized in current network systems. In this Special Issue (SI), we aim to bring together academic researchers, industrial practitioners, and individuals working in this emerging exciting research area to share their innovative ideas and latest findings, and identify and discuss potential use cases, open research problems, technical challenges, and solution methods in the context of standardization. This SI is targeted at the above issues related to Self-Organizing Networks: QoS Provision and Resource Management. Authors are invited to submit previously unpublished papers to this Special Issue. 

Topics include, but are not limited to: 

    ML/DL for Self-organizing Networks.
    SDN/Network Slicing for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Blockchain for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Edge Computing for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Big Data Analytics for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Federated Learning for Self-Organizing Networks.
    IoT for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Dynamic Resource Allocation Techniques.
    Quantum Computing for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Decentralized AI for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Autonomous Network architectures and protocol designs.
    Quality of Service (QoS) issues such as Dynamic Resource Allocation.
    Spectrum Allocation and Energy Efficiency.
    Enabling Trust for Self-Organizing Networks.
    Futuristic paradigms for advanced use cases; adopting blockchain, quantum communication, etc.
    Parameters like interoperability, heterogeneity, and bandwidth in congested networks.
    Optimization Techniques (e.g. Haris Hawk) for Self-Organizing Networks.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format as indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. Select “October2024/Self-Organizing Networks: Opportunities, Challenges, and Applications” from the drop-down menu of Topic/Series titles.

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 1 January 2025 (Deadline Extended)
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 1 February 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 March 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 15 April 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 April 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 May 2025
Expected Publication Date: September 2025

Guest Editors

Kapal Dev
Munster Technical University, Ireland

Yang Xiao
University of Alabama, USA

Sunder Ali Khowaja 
TU Dublin, Ireland 

Atul Kumar Pandey
IIT BHU, India

Maurizio Magarini
Politecnico di Milnao, Italy

Special Issue on Empowering Robotics With 6G: Connectivity, Intelligence, and Beyond
Submission Date: 2025-02-28

The evolution of mobile networks, particularly with 5G and beyond, aims to enhance robotics functionality through real-time control and multimodal data transfer, where low latency is crucial. Achieving interoperability among diverse communication technologies, such as 5G Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Communication (URLLC), is essential for advancing robotics capabilities in sensing, perception, cognition, and actuation.

Recent advancements in 5G and the upcoming 6G technologies highlight the significant benefits that robotics, IoT, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning can offer, particularly in improving efficiency, reducing emissions, and lowering costs across various industries. 6G introduces capabilities, such as High Reliability Low Latency Communication (HRLLC), massive communication, Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC), AI-enhanced communication, ubiquitous connectivity, and immersive communication experiences. In addition to new communication-specific usage scenarios, such as Immersive Communications, ITU-R has also envisioned a number of beyond-communication capabilities for IMT-2030 systems that could significantly impact robotic systems and networks. In particular, ISAC and the integration of (native) AI across all layers of the communication ecosystem are expected to fundamentally change how robots operate in the future. ITU-R anticipates that future connected devices may become fully context-aware, enabling more intuitive and efficient interactions among humans, machines, and the environment. Autonomous networks may also be capable of self-monitoring, self-organizing, self-optimizing, and self-healing functions without human intervention. Furthermore, cobots are expected to play a major role in future automated industries.

On the other hand, ISAC in IMT-2030 will provision ubiquitous sensing, extending the IMT-2020’s massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC) usage scenario and providing machines, robots, and swarms with new sensing-related abilities. The standardization of these capabilities is crucial to ensure interoperability and seamless integration across various robotic applications, thereby unlocking the full potential of the robotics industry.

This Special Issue (SI) aims to provide a compendium of technical papers and vision-setting articles from academia, industry, and standardization activities, focusing on major disruptive trends related to 6G empowering Robotics (6G Robo).

Topics of interest for this SI include, but are not limited to:

    Integrated Sensing and Communications for 6G Robo.
    THz and millimeter wave channelling for 6G Robo.
    Development of PHY algorithms and protocol designs for 6G Robo.
    New and enhanced 6G capabilities essential for robotic applications.
    Teleoperated robotics and the role of 6G communication networks.
    Convergence of robotics, AI, machine learning, and IoT with 6G technologies.
    Ethical and privacy issues for AI models using data from robotic sensors and 6G.
    Advanced connectivity solutions for enabling robotic systems.
    Robotic connectivity, perception, and control enabled by 6G technology.
    Transformative potential of 6G Robo ensuring safe robotic operations.
    Efficient, low-emission, and cost-effective robotic applications powered by 6G Robo.
    Mobile robotics and navigation over 6G technology.
    Cognitive communication solutions in enabling adaptive and context-aware robotic systems through 6G.
    Frameworks for shared control and task allocation in human-robot interactions.
    Standardization efforts to align 6G technologies with existing robotic frameworks and protocols for enhanced collaboration.

We invite researchers, practitioners, industry experts, and standardization specialists to contribute to this Special Issue by submitting original research articles, reviews, and vision papers that address these themes and advance the understanding of 6G's role in empowering robotics and the route to standardization.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format as indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines.

All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. Select the “6G Empowering Robotics” topic from the drop-down menu of Topic/Series titles.

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 28 February 2025
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 30 April 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 June 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 30 June 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 15 July 2025 
Expected Publication Date: September 2025

Guest Editors

Mona Ghassemian
Huawei Technologies, UK

Xueli An
Huawei Technologies, Germany

Aryan Kaushik
Manchester Metropolitan University

Mahdi Tavakoli
University of Alberta, Canada

Douwe Dresscher
University of Twente, Netherlands 

Kaspar Althoefer
Queen Mary University of London, UK 

Special Issue on Semantic Communications for 6G
Submission Date: 2025-03-30

The confluence of advancements in communication and Artificial Intelligence (AI), alongside the rapid progression of digitalization, has catalyzed the expansive growth of communication. The emergence of applications, such as Extended Reality (XR), Digital Twin (DT), industrial automation, autonomous vehicles, and humanoid robots, introduces multi-modal data, diverse tasks, and stringent requirements. These developments present critical challenges to traditional digital communication systems, which are often ill-equipped to meet the demands of 6G communication. This necessitates revolutionary solutions within the 6G framework, particularly architectures that inherently integrate AI to enhance the performance of 6G. Moreover, semantic communication technology is the linchpin to achieving this vision. Semantic communication not only bolsters device interoperability but also enriches the interpretability and actionability of data, thereby facilitating specialized tasks within 6G. Preliminary research on "semantic communications" has primarily centered on employing a lot of data as a semantic metric to encapsulate the essence of information. This approach defines novel metrics aimed at gauging performance effectiveness for specific tasks. Therefore, this Special Issue (SI) aims to provide a compendium of technical papers and vision-setting articles from academia, industry, and standardization activities, focusing on major disruptive trends related to semantic communication for 6G.

Motivated by current trends in the field of semantic communication, we seek to assemble cross-cutting and high-quality original research papers in the following areas, but not limited to：

    New architecture for semantic communications.
    Multi-modal data for semantic communications.
    Network optimization for semantic communications.
    Semantic communications for the Internet of Things.
    Semantic communications for extended reality .
    Semantic communications for digital twin.
    Semantic communications for edge learning.
    Generative AI for semantic communication.
    Explainability issue of semantic communications.
    Privacy and security issues of semantic communications.
    Experiments and testbeds of semantic communications.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. The timetable is as follows:

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 30 March 2025 
Authors' Revision Notification Date: 30 June 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 August 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 15 September 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 September 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 October 2025
Expected Publication Date: December 2025

Guest Editors

Mingkai Chen
Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, China

Shahid Mumtaz
Nottingham Trent University, UK

Ikram Ashraf
Nokia, Finland

Varun G Menon
SCMS School of Engineering and Technology, Kerala, India

Special Issue on AI-Native Radio Access Network (RAN)
Submission Date: 2025-03-30

The evolution of wireless communication technologies has brought us to the era of 5G-Advanced, setting the stage for the development of 6G. In this context, artificial intelligence (AI) emerges as a transformative paradigm. Notably, AI-native radio access network (RAN) is becoming a pivotal area of research and development. An AI-native RAN leverages AI to optimize and manage the complexities of the radio access network, enabling more efficient, adaptive, and intelligent network operations. End-to-end communication using neural networks is an example of such approaches. This approach promises to enhance and simplify end-to-end communication, improve network performance, and support a wide range of new applications and services. The motivation for this Special Issue (SI) stems from the need to explore new AI-driven approaches and technologies to enhance the capabilities of RAN in 5G-Advanced and beyond. Submissions are particularly encouraged to address how these AI techniques can be integrated into existing or upcoming communication standards, contributing to the evolution of standardization in wireless networks.

This SI aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the latest research, innovations, and future directions in AI-native RAN within the context of 5G-Advanced and beyond. It will cover theoretical, experimental, standardization, and practical aspects, addressing challenges, proposing novel solutions, and highlighting the potential applications of AI in RAN optimization and management. We welcome interdisciplinary contributions from fields, such as computer science and electrical engineering. Submissions that emphasize standardization efforts and practical implementations aligned with industry standards are particularly encouraged.

Topics of interest for this SI include, but are not limited to:

    AI-driven modulation and coding techniques for RAN.
    Autoencoder-based end-to-end communication optimization.
    Interference-aware end-to-end communication.
    End-to-end integrated communication and sensing (ISAC).
    End-to-end non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA).
    Deep learning for RAN optimization and automation.
    Reinforcement learning for RAN resource allocation.
    AI-native RAN architecture and protocol design.
    AI for MIMO and beamforming in RAN.
    AI-driven interference management and mitigation.
    Security and scalability in AI-native RAN.
    Implementations and experimental works on AI-native RAN.
    Energy-efficient AI techniques for RAN.
    Performance evaluation and benchmarking of AI-native RAN systems.
    AI-driven RAN for IoT and smart cities.
    Ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) and AI-native RAN.
    The evolution of open RAN and C-RAN to AI-native RAN.
    Standardization and testing of end-to-end communication systems.
    End-to-end sensing and radar detection.
    Generative AI in AI-native RAN.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format as indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines.

All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. Select the “AI-native RAN” topic from the drop-down menu of Topic/Series titles.

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 30 March 2025 
Authors' Revision Notification Date: 30 June 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 15 August 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 15 September 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 September 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 October 2025
Expected Publication Date: December 2025

Guest Editors

Mojtaba Vaezi
Villanova University, USA

Xingqin Lin
NVIDIA, USA

Tim O’Shea
DeepSig, USA

Robert Schober
Friedrich-Alexander-University, Germany

Melike Erol-Kantarci
University of Ottawa and Ericsson, Canada

Chih-Lin I
China Mobile, China

Hamid Jafarkhani
University of California Irvine, USA

Special Issue on Standardization and Integration of Blockchain and Federated Learning for Decentralized Edge Intelligence in Next-Generation IoT Security
Submission Date: 2025-03-31

Edge computing has completely changed the field of modern applications, such as industrial IoT (Internet-of-Things), smart cities, autonomous cars, and healthcare. These applications require real-time responses, low latency, and high model reliability. To achieve these requirements, it is critical to decentralize data analytics beyond typical cloud architecture. Integrating decentralized machine intelligence allows for rapid and context-aware decision-making, establishing edge and fog computing as complementing infrastructures to centralized cloud systems. Federated learning (FL) is a crucial advancement for privacy-preserving machine learning since it allows models to be trained across scattered devices and clients without requiring centralized data aggregation. In FL, clients iteratively update models on local datasets, which are then aggregated by a central server. This method works exceptionally well for real-world FL applications that run in distributed, heterogeneous environments with different data distributions, computational capacities, and environmental factors. FL improves security and privacy while optimizing resource management, making it appropriate for IoT applications, like smart healthcare, smart transportation, and smart cities. Despite their advantages, FL and IoT face substantial challenges, such as communication overhead, privacy leakage, scalability, and limited resource constraints. Blockchain technology provides a viable answer to these difficulties due to its decentralized architecture, which includes security features such as immutability, transparency, and trust. Integrating blockchain with FL and IoT can reduce data leakage and serve as a replacement for aggregation servers. Models stored on the blockchain can be downloaded by devices for local training. Therefore, this Special Issue (SI) aims to provide a compendium of technical papers and vision-setting articles from academia, industry, and standardization activities, focusing on major disruptive trends related to integrating FL and blockchain for IoT applications.

This SI will focus on the critical integration of FL and blockchain for applications within the IoT, paying close attention to emerging standards and regulatory frameworks that shape this convergence. The recent developments in the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) represent a transformative evolution within telecommunications, establishing new benchmarks for advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, particularly in the domain of Radio Access Networks and network optimization. These releases are intended to create a robust framework for secure and efficient AI-driven operations within network infrastructures, enhancing the adaptability, performance, and intelligence of next-generation IoT ecosystems.

Motivated by current trends in the field of integrated FL and Blockchain, we seek to assemble high quality and crosscutting original research papers in the following areas, but not limited to:

    Blockchain-based design choices for FL-based IoT security.
    Blockchain as a standardized trust mechanism in FL for IoT.
    IoT-enabled system using homomorphic safeguarding for privacy-preserving federated learning Intelligent federated learning approach.
    Regulatory and Ethical Considerations for federated learning and blockchain in IoT ecosystems.
    Blockchain-based applications in IoT scenario.
    FL applications in wireless networks (5G, 6G), IoT, vehicular and mobile networks, urban environments, smart cities, and healthcare.
    FL and blockchain-based application for smart healthcare and smart city.
    Enhancing explainability and interpretability in FL.
    Consensus and incentive mechanisms for blockchain-based FL mechanisms. 
    FL client selection and coordination.
    FL-based intelligent system for Industry 5.0.
    Complex IoT applications supported by both FL and blockchain.
    Challenges of fairness, bias and interpretability in FL with foundational models. 
    Scalability and performance optimization in blockchain-based FL. 
    Personalizing FL with foundational models.
    Comparison of blockchain platform for IoT and FL applications.
    Communication-efficient FL strategies.
    Security issues, threats, and breaches in IoT applications.
    Security and privacy solutions for FL platforms.
    FL-based cloud computing with privacy preservation for intelligent utilities.
    Applications of federated and distributed learning in preserving the privacy of medical data.
    Security and privacy enhancements in blockchain-based FL.
    Security mechanisms in asynchronous FL.
    Asynchronous FL for IoT applications.

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. The timetable is as follows:

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 31 March 2025
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 1 May 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 1 July 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 1 September 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 September 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 October 2025
Expected Publication Date: December 2025

Guest Editors

Mohit Kumar (Lead Guest Editor)
National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar, India

Aryan Kaushik 
University of Sussex, UK

Carlo Fischione
KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden

Victor Sheng
Texas Tech University, USA

Special Issue on Wireless Technologies for 6G and Beyond: Applications, Implementations, and Standardization
Submission Date: 2025-03-31

Wireless communication technologies have fundamentally transformed how we connect and communicate, allowing data transmission without physical connections through electromagnetic waves. This encompasses a range of technologies, including cellular networks (2G to 5G), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, satellite communication, and IoT protocols, like Zigbee and LoRaWAN. Each of these technologies serves specific purposes, from mobile communication to local networking and remote connectivity, enabling applications in everyday life and industry. Standardization is essential, ensuring interoperability, compatibility, and efficiency among diverse systems. Organizations, such as the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT), and the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) play crucial roles in developing and maintaining these standards. Standardization not only facilitates seamless communication between devices from different manufacturers but also fosters innovation by providing frameworks for new technologies to be integrated.

Academia and industry are continuously focusing on new technologies for various emerging applications, aiming to support heterogeneous use cases seamlessly. To address next-generation wireless communication, we invite submissions to the call for papers. As the world rapidly transitions to 5G and prepares for the next generation of wireless technologies, significant advancements in system design, deployment, and standardization are crucial. This Special Issue (SI) seeks innovative research that explores new applications, architectures, and implementation techniques for 5G and beyond, including emerging use cases such as IoT, V2X, ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC), and massive connectivity. Additionally, we encourage contributions that focus on the development of industry standards and regulatory frameworks necessary to support global adoption in wireless networks.

This SI covers a broad range of topics in wireless communication, including communication over high-frequency bands, flexible multiple access techniques, AI/ML for network optimization, and spectrum management with energy efficient system design. Accepted papers will help advance the field of wireless communications, bridging the gap between cutting-edge research and practical standardization efforts. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

    Flexible multiple access techniques like Sparse Code Multiple Access (SCMA), NOMA, RSMA, etc.
    Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (RIS)-aided wireless systems. 
    AI/ML for wireless systems. 
    Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) and orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) modulation. 
    Beamforming techniques for mmWave and Terahertz MIMO systems. 
    Resource allocation in 5G and beyond wireless systems. 
    Software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) for 5G and beyond.
    Network slicing for 5G and beyond use cases.
    Integrated terrestrial and satellite communications. 
    Modulation techniques for ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC).
    AI-driven network optimization and self-organizing networks (SONs).
    Machine learning for signal detection and channel estimation.
    Enabling technologies for 6G.
    Preliminary standardization efforts for 6G.
    Energy-efficient technologies for 5G and beyond.
    Vehicular and V2X communications.
    Contributions to IEEE, 3GPP, and ITU standards for 5G and beyond.
    Physical layer security techniques in 5G and beyond.
    Resource allocation and spectrum management in 5G and beyond. 
    Edge computing and IoT in 5G networks.
    Massive MIMO systems and beamforming techniques.
    Open Radio Access Network (O-RAN)-based design. 

Submission Guidelines

Manuscripts should conform to the standard format indicated in the Information for Authors section of the Paper Submission Guidelines. All manuscripts to be considered for publication must be submitted by the deadline through Manuscript Central. The timetable is as follows:

Important Dates

Manuscript Submission Deadline: 31 March 2025
Authors’ Revision Notification Date: 1 May 2025
Revised Manuscript Submission Deadline: 1 July 2025
Final Decision Notification Date: 1 September 2025
Camera-ready Files Due: 30 September 2025
Guest Editorial/Column: 15 October 2025
Expected Publication Date: December 2025

Guest Editors

Sanjeev Sharma (Lead Guest Editor)
IIT Varanasi, India

Aryan Kaushik
Manchester Metropolitan University, UK

Igal Bilik
Ben Gurion University, Israel

Jithin Jagannath
Andro Computational Solutions, USA

Martin Schubert
Huawei, Technologies Düsseldorf GmbH, München, Germany