Radio access technology

A radio access technology (RAT) is the underlying physical connection method for a radio communication network. Many modern mobile phones support several RATs in one device such as Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and GSM, UMTS, LTE or 5G NR.

The term RAT was traditionally used in mobile communication network interoperability.[1] More recently, the term RAT is used in discussions of heterogeneous wireless networks.[2] The term is used when a user device selects between the type of RAT being used to connect to the Internet. This is often performed similar to access point selection in IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) based networks.[3]

  1. ^ I. Virtej; S. Hamiti; T.A. Rantalainen; J. Parantainen; G. Sebire; E. Nikula (November 2001). "Radio resource control for GSM/EDGE Radio Access Network (GERAN)-inter radio access technology and inter-mode procedures". IEEE 54th Vehicular Technology Conference. VTC Fall 2001. Proceedings (Cat. No.01CH37211). Vol. 3. pp. 1417–1421. doi:10.1109/VTC.2001.956430. ISBN 0-7803-7005-8. S2CID 9731093.
  2. ^ S. O. Holland, A. Aijaz, F. Kaltenberger, F. Foukalas, G. Vivier, M. Buczkowski and S. Pietrzyk"[https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/7565257 Management architecture for aggregation of heterogeneous systems and spectrum bands ]." IEEE Communications Magazine ( Volume: 54 , Issue: 9, Sep. 2016, pp. 112–118.
  3. ^ Melhem El Helou; Samer Lahoud; Marc Ibrahim; Kinda Khawam (April 2013). "A Hybrid Approach for Radio Access Technology Selection in Heterogeneous Wireless Networks". 19th European Wireless Conference -Proceedings. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 October 2003. Retrieved 2013-10-07.