Compared to previous mobile generations, the 5G system architecture offers more flexibility to fulfill a richer set of diverse requirements. Three system aspects play a major role here: support of network slicing, a split between the user plane and the control plane, and a service oriented control architecture. Emerging techniques of network softwarization such as software-defined networking are leveraged to provide this notion of flexibility manifested in a software-defined core network. However, in addition to the 5G core (5GC), analogous concepts could be applied to the next generation radio access network to sustain the required system performance. Driven by the increased attention that is currently paid to a software-defined radio access network, in this article, we propose the radio access network control function (RANCF) as an additional 5G control function. We define the main functionalities of RANCF, and propose interfaces and protocols for the interaction with 5GC functions. Exploiting network slicing as an example, we demonstrate how RANCF facilitates the slice selection and slice management procedure.

中文翻译：

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控制下一代软件定义的 RAN

与前几代移动设备相比，5G 系统架构提供了更大的灵活性来满足更丰富的多样化需求。三个系统方面在这里起着主要作用：支持网络切片、用户平面和控制平面之间的分离以及面向服务的控制架构。利用软件定义网络等新兴网络软件化技术来提供这种体现在软件定义核心网络中的灵活性概念。然而，除了 5G 核心 (5GC) 之外，类似的概念可以应用于下一代无线接入网络，以维持所需的系统性能。在当前对软件定义的无线电接入网络越来越关注的推动下，在本文中，我们建议将无线电接入网络控制功能 (RANCF) 作为附加的 5G 控制功能。我们定义了 RANCF 的主要功能，并提出了与 5GC 功能交互的接口和协议。以网络切片为例，我们演示了 RANCF 如何促进切片选择和切片管理过程。