Machine Learning-Based Integrated Wireless Sensing and Positioning for Cellular Network

Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) is one of the most promising technical directions in B5G/6G era. Nevertheless, it is challenging for network operators to provide proper human-centric services (HCSs), appropriately with the explosive growth of mobile terminals in constantly changing scenarios. Scenario sensing is the foundation to provide users with intelligent context-aware services, while the combination of machine learning (ML) and automatic data collection enables network operators to become more flexible in decision-making and planning. In this article, an ML-based integrated indoor/outdoor (IO) sensing and positioning framework is proposed to improve the potential of ML in the context of cellular network service management. First, large amounts of measurement reports (MRs) are collected over Layer 3 at user equipment (UE) and evolved NodeBs (eNBs) in urban areas, including both indoor and outdoor samples to simulate the minimization of drive test (MDT). Then, a random-forest-based IO classifier is implemented to sense the mobile scenarios and filter the positioning fingerprints. Subsequently, the weighted K -nearest neighbor (WKNN)-based Enhanced Cell ID (ECID) merging with the MR method is used for cellular positioning. The performance evaluation has shown that the positioning error of the MRs after denoising is effectively reduced compared with the conventional fingerprint-based positioning. Specifically, under the 67% standard defined by Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the resulting positioning error is about 4% lower than the case without preprocessing. In addition, comparative experiments are conducted to discuss the impact of different K values at different data sizes of fingerprints. Moreover, the further data analysis shows that MRs collected in the mild indoor (MI) scenarios have a positive effect on the overall positioning error, which indicates that refined contextualizations contribute to the cellular positioning for HCS upgrade.