A comprehensive review of terahertz technologies for next-generation vehicular communications

Abstract

The terahertz (THz) band is seen as one of the potentially essential technologies for meeting the requirement for terabit (Tbit) per second data throughput in future networks. THz communication system upgrades are becoming increasingly important and have attracted the interest of many researchers as THz devices continue to progress. When viewed from the perspective of vehicular communications, the rapidly escalating data demand is increasingly exceeding the capabilities of existing communication technologies. In order to provide greater capacity and data rate with lower latency, new technologies and methods are therefore needed. THz technology is widely recognized as a promising approach capable of addressing these emerging requirements. The goal of this paper is to review the most recent works in the area of vehicular communication in the THz band, provide a critical evaluation of the existing achievements and compare them in several aspects. More specifically, THz channel modeling is considered with an emphasis on molecular absorption loss and multipath fading defining the advantages and challenges of THz technology for vehicular communications.