This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management.
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A Comprehensive Survey on IRS-Assisted
NOMA-based 6G Wireless Network: Design
Perspectives, Challenges and Future Directions
Debbarni Sarkar, Student Member, IEEE, Yogita, Senior Member, IEEE, Satyendra Singh
Yadav∗ , Member, IEEE, Vipin Pal, Senior Member, IEEE, Neeraj Kumar, Senior Member, IEEE and Sarat Kumar
Patra, Senior Member, IEEE
Abstract— The propagation environment was uncontrollable
in first-generation to fifth-generation (5G) wireless technologies.
This behavior of the wireless propagation environment is one of
the prime constraints in harnessing the performance of wireless
networks. This problem can be addressed in sixth-generation
(6G) wireless networks by deploying intelligent reflecting surfaces
(IRSs). IRS’s amplitude and phase reflecting coefficient of reflect-
ing units (RUs) can be adjusted via a programmable controller to
meet the network requirements. On the other hand, in 5G and
6G wireless communication networks, non-orthogonal multiple
access (NOMA) is a robust and well-admired multiple access
scheme among the other multiple access counterparts in terms
of spectrum efficiency and link capacity. NOMA allows many
user equipment (UE) by utilizing non-orthogonal distribution of
resources. Therefore, the combination of IRS and NOMA is one of
the dominant technologies for 6G wireless networks. Based upon
the importance of NOMA and IRS in the initial development
of 6G wireless networks, this paper presents a comprehensive
survey on IRS-assisted NOMA-based networks, considering their
designs and challenges. In this work, the concept and structure
of IRS-assisted NOMA have been explained with an in-depth
analysis of the frameworks. It also includes some challenges
of IRS-assisted NOMA in wireless communication networks.
Further, applications and future research directions of IRS-
assisted NOMA networks are discussed.
Index Terms—Intelligent reflecting surfaces, non-orthogonal
multiple access, orthogonal multiple access, reflecting units,
orthogonal frequency division multiplexing, multiple input and
multiple output, sixth-generation.
I. I NTRODUCTION
he sixth-generation (6G)1 wireless networks must of-
T fer highly effective, robust, dependable, and adaptable
network designs for future wireless applications. To meet
these objectives, various antennas, sophisticated encoding and
decoding algorithms at the communication link’s endpoints
Debbarni Sarkar and Satyendra Singh Yadav are with the Department of
ECE, National Institute of Technology Meghalaya, India, e-mail: (debbar-
nisarkar19@gmail.com and satyendra@ieee.org)
Yogita is with the Department of CSE, National Institute of Technology
Kurukshetra, India, e-mail: thakranyogita@gmail.com
Vipin Pal is with the Department of CSE, Netaji Subhas University of
Technology Delhi, India, e-mail: vipinrwr@gmail.com
Neeraj Kumar is with the Department CSE, Thapar Institute of Engineering
& Technology, India, e-mail: neeraj.kumar@thapar.edu
Sarat Kumar Patra is with the Department of ECE, National Institute of
Technology Agartala, India, e-mail: skpatra@nitrkl.ac.in
∗ Corresponding Author
Manuscript received September XX, 2023; revised XX XX, XX
1 The abbreviations used in this paper are collected in Table I
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have been introduced [1]–[3] and extra network frameworks,
such as relays are used for reliable communication [4]. How-
ever, these solutions enhance the network’s complexity, power
consumption, and deployment cost. In recent years, intelligent
reflecting surface (IRS) has gained much attraction since
IRS offers low complexity, intelligence, and energy-efficient
wireless network [5]–[8]. IRS establishes virtual line-of-sight
(LoS) communication links between the base station (BS) and
the user equipments (UEs). IRS is an energy-efficient and low-
cost solution compared to conventional relaying technologies
as it does not consist of radio frequency lines or high-power
spending elements. IRS can be smoothly incorporated into
recent networks to achieve various goals, such as high energy
efficiency and low inter-user interference [9]. For long-term
evolution, fifth-generation (5G) and beyond fifth-generation
(B5G) systems, non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is a
potential candidate among multiple access (MA) techniques.
NOMA obtains greater spectral and energy efficiency and
assists massive connectivity than OMA, as NOMA operates
on a power level, many UEs access the resources in terms of
time, frequency, and coding when co-scheduled. IRS provides
a controllable path among users and enhances the efficiency of
NOMA frameworks. IRS constructively or destructively adds
the user multipath signals to suppress inter-user interference
and improve the throughput of NOMA frameworks. IRS-
assisted NOMA technology can improve spectral effectiveness,
UE fairness, response time, and privacy requirements [10]. The
rest of the related papers on the IRS and NOMA have been
elaborated in the following subsection, representing a literature
review of the IRS and NOMA.
A. Literature of IRS, NOMA and IRS-assisted NOMA
Under this subsection, brief literature about IRS, NOMA,
and IRS-assisted NOMA has been presented.
1) IRS : In [11], authors provided a tutorial overview
of IRS-aided wireless communication and presented details
of reflection, links design, hardware structure, and practical
limitations. Further, different applications of IRS in wireless
networks are examined. In [12], the authors presented a
thorough review of channel estimation and practical passive
beamforming design for IRS-aided wireless communications
and also provided promising answers to solve the conven-
tional network design issues. The basic concepts of the
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138

TABLE I: Abbreviations collection the transmit beamforming vector, covariance, and IRS phase
Label Explanation LabelExplanation shifts. An approach based on alternating optimization, in
2D Two dimensional LSTM Long short-term memory which the optimization variables were optimized alternately,
5G Fifth-generation MA Multiple access
6G Sixth-generation MEC Mobile edge computing
was presented to resolve it. To overcome the chance constraint,
AP Access point MIMO Multiple input and mul- the buffer time index was used. The beamforming vector
tiple output and IRS phase shifts were created using the semi-definite-
AWGN Additive white Gaussian MISO Multiple input and single
noise output
relaxation (SDR) approach. Specifically, a penalty mechanism
BER Bit error rate ML Machine learning was used to manage the non-convex unit modulus constraint.
B5G Beyond fifth-generation mm Millimeter Simulation findings confirmed the efficiency of the IRS in
BS Base station MSE Mean Square Error
CDMA Code division multiple NOMA Non-orthogonal multiple
increasing the PLS of wireless communications. The other
access access relevant papers on IRS are summarized in Table II.
CSI Channel state informa- NLoS Non-line-of-sight
tion TABLE II: Summarized review on IRS along with key contri-
DC Direct current OFDMA Orthogonal frequency di-
vision multiplexing ac-
butions.
cess References Main contribution
DL Deep learning OMA Orthogonal multiple ac- [20]–[23] Explained a complete study on the IRS technology for
cess intelligent future wireless communication.
D2D Device to device PIN Positive-intrinsic- [24]–[26] Described a performance comparison of IRS-aided next-
negative generation network and relay-based framework. The nu-
DQN Deep-Q-network PLS Physical layer security merical result shows the large IRS-aided framework
ED Eavesdropper QoS Quality of service outperforms the relay-aided framework.
EM Electromagnetic RU Reflecting unit [27]–[34] Explained the research work on the IRS-assisted MIMO
FD Full-duplex SDR Semi-definite-relaxation system based on parameters such as capacity characteri-
FDMA Frequency division mul- SIC Successive interference zation, secrecy rate optimization, channel estimation, and
tiple access cancellation throughput maximization, etc.
FPGA Field-programmable gate SINR Signal-to-interference- [35]–[38] Provided a robust and PLS in an IRS-based wireless
array plus-noise ratio network.
GFU Grant-free user SNR Signal-to-noise ratio [39]–[42] Employed an IRS in the wireless communication system
HARQ Hybrid automatic repeat SWIPT Simultaneous wireless to enhance the security of the wireless communication
request information and power network.
transfer
IoT Internet-of-things TDMA Time division multiple
access
IRS Intelligent reflecting sur- THz Terahertz 2) NOMA : The authors described the present survey of
face NOMA in [43]. It presented the challenges and advantages
K-GMM K-means-based Gaussian UE User equipment
mixture model
of NOMA as a candidate technology in dense networks.
LoS Line-of-sight UAV Unmanned aerial vehicle In wireless communication, different protocols and standards
have already been used. However, interference persists, keep-
ing giving quality of service (QoS) provisions to users for
IRS, the realizations of its reconfigurability, its applications 5G applications. To reduce the above mentioned issues, [44]
in wireless communications, different performance metrics, explained an in-depth survey of state-of-the-art NOMA vari-
analytical approaches to characterize, and its performance ants. Here, the variants were power domain NOMA and code
improvement for wireless networks were explained in [13]. domain NOMA. In 5G wireless communication, these variants
In [14], authors described the concepts of IRSs from physics can mitigate interference and manage the network’s resource
and communications perspectives and discussed the perfor- allocations and QoS. In [45], the authors proposed the idea
mance evaluation of multi-antenna-aided IRS networks. Per- of a multiple interference cancellation technique to enhance
formance comparison of an IRS and a relay-aided network in NOMA-aided device-to-device communication network per-
terms of achievable rate and energy efficiency is discussed formance. This proposed technique reduces more interference
in [15]. The detailed analysis of IRS-aided multiple input than successive interference cancellation (SIC). In [46], the
and multiple output (MIMO) communication framework is achievable power regions were explained, demonstrating that
explained in [16]. In [17], authors used IRSs to increase the NOMA is more energy efficient than OMA. Moreover, the
physical layer security (PLS) in a radio environment. In [18], role of scheduling-based resource allocation and grant-free
authors enhanced anti-jamming communication performance transmission was discussed. Furthermore, a hybrid NOMA
and mitigated jamming interference by adjusting the reflecting strategy was examined to provide better energy efficiency
surface elements at the IRS. Specifically, an optimization and throughput. Finally, some pressing challenges and future
problem was formulated by jointly optimizing the transmit research directions of NOMA were presented. Recently, Visi-
power at the BS and reflecting beamforming at the IRS. ble light communication is a key communication system that
IRS-aided wireless communication systems were designed for suffers from low power bandwidth. To overcome the above
secure transmission in [19] in which, for the first time in problem, in [47], the authors used the cooperative-NOMA in
secure communications, the cascaded IRS channel’s statistical this system to enhance the outage performance and reliability.
channel state information (CSI) error was taken into account. In [48], a novel algorithm was proposed to allocate resources,
The outage-constrained power-minimization problem was then including subcarriers, power, and technology selection vari-
developed to reduce the transmit power by co-optimizing ables. A novel utility function was defined, which reflected

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the tradeoff between the achievable rate and the imposed cost
for NOMA processing. To efficiently overcome the resource
allocation problem, a two-step iterative algorithm was formed
where, in the first step, by introducing auxiliary variables,
the subcarrier assignment and technology selection problem
was transformed and solved using linear integer programming.
Subsequently, in the second step, the power allocation was
solved by applying direct current (DC) programming. In [49],
authors reviewed the power domain NOMA-based coopera-
tive network for performance analysis of resources allocation
and impact of relay selection. Additionally, it discussed the
performance of cooperative power domain-NOMA networks
when they were integrated with other 5G technologies, in-
cluding cognitive radio, full-duplex (FD) radio, and wireless
energy harvesting. Furthermore, some unaddressed issues were
highlighted for future research. In [50], the authors examined
the UE clustering and power allocation for downlink hybrid
NOMA networks. The authors established the newest and most
well-known 5G mobile communication technology in [51],
providing features like increased spectral efficiency, high reli-
ability, widespread connectivity, and high throughput. In [52],
the authors investigated the joint transmission time and power
allocation problem for NOMA communication to improve the
sum throughput while guaranteeing different wireless devices
throughput in multi-cell wireless planning and coordination
networks. Table III summarized the other related papers on
NOMA.
TABLE III: Summarized review on NOMA along with key
contributions.
References Main contribution
[53]–[58] Provided a comprehensive review of NOMA networks.
[59]–[63] Addressed the UE fairness issue for NOMA network.
[64]–[66] Examined NOMA for future wireless network.
[67]–[69] Presented a comprehensive overview of the power do-
main NOMA-based network.
[70]–[74] Provided the different performance and application of
power domain NOMA such as application in satellite
communication, the performance of cooperative relaying
system, power allocation strategy for 6G network and the
performance for FD one way relay network.
[75], [76] Presented the performance comparison of orthogonal
multiple access (OMA) and NOMA technique for wire-
less communication.
[77]–[81] Proposed UE clustering approach based on power and
energy efficiency in NOMA network.
[82] Described the performance of a multiuser uplink NOMA-
based underlay network. In this paper, the authors consid-
ered that NOMA operates by imperfect SIC and analyzed
the performance by an intelligent user selection strategy.
3) IRS-assisted NOMA : In [83], the authors explained
the simple design of the IRS-assisted NOMA transmission
network. Here, spatial division multiple access allows for
serving more customers in each orthogonal spatial direction.
Additionally, the performance of real-world transmission and
the effect of hardware impairments on IRS-assisted NOMA
design has been shown. In [84], to solve the joint power control
and IRS phase shifts optimization problem, the relationship
between individual users transmit power, and the variables of
phase shifts was explored. Then, the phase shift determination
problem was solved by the sequential rotation algorithm. In a
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conventional communication scenario, it isn’t easy to achieve
quasi-degradation as the propagation environments calculate
the channels and cannot be reconfigured. To overcome this
difficulty, an IRS-assisted multiple input and single output
(MISO)-NOMA system was considered in [85], where the
wireless channels can be effectively changed, and to mini-
mize transmission power, the beamforming vectors and the
IRS phase shift matrix were optimized. In [86], an IRS-
assisted NOMA-based internet-of-things (IoT) network was
considered. Here, to maximize the sum throughput, a resource
allocation scheme was proposed by optimizing the IRS’s time
allocation factor and phase shift matrices. In [87], an IRS-
assisted uplink NOMA system was presented to maximize
the sum rate of all users under individual power constraints.
This problem needed a joint power control at the users and
beamforming design at the IRS, which was non-convex. SDR
was used to overcome it, which provided a near-optimal
solution. The authors in [88] examined the effects of two-
phase shifting designs in IRS-assisted NOMA networks, such
as coherent phase shifting and random discrete phase shifting.
In [89], the authors discussed the throughput and energy
efficiency of IRS-assisted NOMA networks for both delay-
limited and delay tolerant transmission modes. The authors
also provided the performance of an IRS-assisted NOMA
network with imperfect-SIC and perfect-SIC for invoking a
1-bit coding scheme. An IRS-assisted NOMA network was
defined in [90] to enhance communication coverage and
energy efficiency. This work proposed an energy-efficient
algorithm to increase the sum rate and to decrease the total
power consumption. Specifically, to maximize the system
energy efficiency, the transmit beamforming at the BS and
the reflecting beamforming at the IRS were jointly optimized,
and the transmit beamforming and the phases of the low-cost
passive elements on the IRS were alternatively optimized for
communication convergence. To enhance the performance of
the IoT equipment in non-line-of-sight (NLoS), the authors
in [91] designed the IRS-assisted NOMA-hybrid automatic
repeat request (HARQ)-based IoT network. The NOMA-based
selection combining with IRS and NOMA-based maximum
ratio combining with IRS schemes had been proposed, and
IoT UE/devices performance was evaluated based on the
achievable data rates, outage probability, bit error rate (BER),
and diversity order with variable Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).
In [92], authors studied the IRS-assisted NOMA network
under both the ideal IRS-assisted continuous phase shifting
and the non-ideal IRS with discrete phase shifting. The authors
in [93] presented the covert communication in an IRS-assisted
NOMA system to improve the performance of covert wireless
communications and to hide the presence of covert (Bob) UE’s
from a warden (Willie). In this paper, to maximize the covert
rates of Bob, the transmit power and the IRS passive beam-
forming were jointly optimized. The different channel perfor-
mance of NOMA-IRS is highlighted in [94]. The other relevant
papers on IRS-assisted NOMA are described in Table IV.
The bar chart2 for the number of papers published on IRS-
2 This data is based on the Scopus database available for different publica-
tions.
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
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TABLE IV: Summarized review on IRS-assisted NOMA along
with key contributions.
References Main contribution
[95] Provided a survey over IRS with NOMA.
[96] Derived the analytical expressions for the BER per-
formance of the proposed IRS-assisted power domain
NOMA system.
[97] Formulated a joint optimization problem over the channel
assignment, decoding order of NOMA UEs, power allo-
cation, and reflection coefficients to maximize the system
throughput.
[98] Proposed a novel network for IRS-assisted Simultaneous
wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) NOMA
networks based on joint beamforming design and power
splitting optimization to enhance the NOMA performance
and efficiency.
[99] Designed the network to enhance the total throughput
of devices by combining improvement of the IRS phase
shifts and the resource allocation.
[100] Considered an IRS-assisted wireless powered communi-
cation framework where a BS transmits energy to multi-
ple UE grouped into multiple clusters in the downlink and
in the uplink, the clustered UEs transmit information to
the BS in the manner of hybrid NOMA and time division
multiple access (TDMA).
[101] Minimized the transmit power IRS with the NOMA
network by jointly optimizing each IRS’s beamforming,
power allocation, and phase shift.
[102]–[106] Proposed an energy-efficient design for an IRS-assisted
NOMA network.
[107] Minimized the average total system energy consumption
by jointly designing the resource allocation strategy,
the three-dimensional trajectory of the unmanned aerial
vehicle (UAV), and the phase control at the IRS.
[108] Considered an IRS-aided NOMA framework to enhance
the total data rate of different mobile UEs.
[109] Maximized sum-rate of IRS-assisted MIMO-NOMA net-
work by enhanced PLS.
[110] Explained the performance throughput of the system in
IRS-aided phase cooperative NOMA network.
[111] Utilized the optimized total latency by considering an
auction-aided IRS allocation approach for the valuation
of the IRSs when multiple BSs of different operators
share their neighboring IRSs.
[112] Derived the exact and asymptotic expressions of outage
probability for a couple of users by using a 1-bit coding
scheme for IRS-assisted NOMA network.
[113] Designed the adaptive user pairing framework to identify
the two ideal user pairings in multi-IRS-aided massive
MIMO-NOMA systems to enhance spectral efficiency.
Deep learning (DL)-based optimization was proposed for
real-time optimization.
assisted NOMA has been presented in Fig. 1. It indicates that
this technique was first reported in 2019, and many research
works on it have been published to date. So it can be analyzed
that the number of articles on this is increasing continuously.
Gradually, this will become an eminent technique for future
wireless networks.
B. Motivation
In wireless communication, the IRS can enhance signal
coverage and decrease energy expenditure with minimum cost.
On the other hand, NOMA offers better spectral efficiency,
massive connectivity, lower latency, and higher QoS. In 6G
wireless communication networks, to take joint advantages of
IRS and NOMA, IRS and NOMA frameworks are combined,
termed as IRS-assisted NOMA framework. Authors have al-
ready reported some work on IRS-assisted NOMA frameworks
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120
106
100
No. of publications
80
60 54 54
40
18
20
3
0
2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Year
Fig. 1: The number of publications for IRS-assisted NOMA
network till October 2023 based on the Scopus database
to improve the performance of wireless networks. However,
a variety of challenges are present in IRS-assisted NOMA
networks. Along with these, there is some work on IRS-
assisted NOMA for performance improvements such as sum
rate maximization, efficient resource utilization, etc. The few
works reported on IRS-assisted NOMA framework for differ-
ent wireless networks like UAV, terahertz (THz) networks, etc.
These reported works have shown significant performance im-
provements. This motivates us to provide an in-depth survey of
the most prominent IRS-assisted NOMA framework for future
wireless networks. Therefore, this paper surveys and discusses
the overview of the IRS, NOMA, and IRS-assisted NOMA
frameworks with the help of mathematical models and a few
simulation outcomes. This paper aims to present a thorough re-
search survey on the IRS-assisted NOMA framework in terms
of design, challenges, research directions, and applications.
It describes the different performances of the IRS-assisted
NOMA framework and compares the performance with the
other technologies to identify the benefits. Further, it points
to the future scopes of the IRS-assisted NOMA framework.
Therefore, it is targeted that readers can gather knowledge of
previous and recent research works on IRS-assisted NOMA
framework from this survey. Thus, they can understand the
importance of this framework in wireless communication.
Moreover, the intention is to provide the idea of improving the
performance of future wireless communication with the help
of IRS-assisted NOMA networks. The critical contributions of
this survey are discussed next.
C. Major contributions
The main contributions of this paper are as follows
• A detailed explanation of the concept and framework of
IRS, NOMA, and IRS-assisted NOMA networks has been
provided through mathematical expressions.
• The instantaneous achievable data rate and outage proba-
bility performance analysis of IRS-assisted NOMA, IRS-
assisted OMA, NOMA, and OMA networks have been
presented through simulation outcomes. Along with the
performance optimization of IRS-assisted NOMA net-
work in green communication, power constraint, cov-
erage extension, sum rate maximization, beamforming
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
optimization, and efficient resource utilization have been
discussed. The PLS measurement and the necessity of
channel estimation are also discussed in detail.
• Some challenges of IRS-assisted NOMA networks in
beamforming design, data transmission approaches, chan-
nel modeling, multiple IRS assignments, phase control,
design, and deployment are presented.
• The applications of IRS-assisted NOMA for multi-
antenna-based communication, UAV communication,
THz communication, mobile edge computing (MEC)
systems, and device-to-device (D2D) communication are
summarized.
• Finally, few future research directions of IRS-assisted
NOMA with machine learning (ML)/DL-based tech-
niques, PLS, and contrasting IRS-assisted OMA and
NOMA technologies are briefly explained.
D. Paper organization
Following this introduction, the rest of the paper is orga-
nized as follows: section II presents the concept and structure
of IRS, NOMA, and IRS-assisted NOMA network. Section III
presents the performance of IRS-assisted NOMA framework.
Section IV presents the challenges of the IRS-assisted NOMA
network. A few future research directions of IRS-assisted
NOMA are given in section VI. Section V describes the few
applications, and finally, section VII concludes this paper. The
organization of this paper is depicted in Fig. 2.
II. C ONCEPT AND S TRUCTURE
In this section, the concept and structure of IRS, NOMA,
and IRS-assisted NOMA networks have been described.
A. IRS
In wireless networks, the signal quality is degraded by
undesirable reflections, refractions, and harmful interfer-
ence [114], [115] since the traditional wireless transmission
environment is uncontrollable. In a 6G wireless network, a
newer technology based on IRS can overcome the above
problem. The poor propagation effects of the wireless channel
can be controlled to provide a stable, reliable, and efficient
communication system. In wireless channel reconfiguration,
IRS can perform many appealing tasks, including establishing
a virtual LoS link to eliminate obstacles between transceivers
via smart reflection, reduce interference, enhancing the chan-
nel rank condition by adding additional signal paths in the
desired direction and IRS for fading channel as shown in
Fig. 3. Low-cost dipoles of IRS passively reflect the lim-
ited transmissions without requiring any transmission radio
frequency chains [116]. As a result, they can be executed
with orders of magnitude lower hardware/energy costs. Ad-
ditionally, IRS operates in FD mode without any antenna
noise amplification and self-interference, providing unique
advantages over other active relays, such as half-duplex relays
with low spectral efficiency and FD relays requiring complex
techniques for self-interference cancellation. In addition, IRS
is easily constructed and eliminated from the landscape for
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implementation and reconstruction because it typically has a
low profile, is lightweight, and has a conformal shape. Finally,
IRS is a wireless network accessory that can be seamlessly
integrated into existing wireless infrastructures, providing high
adaptability and interoperability with technologies like cellular
and WiFi. Consequently, IRS can be widely implemented in
wireless networks to considerably improve their spectral and
energy efficiency at a low cost [116]. IRS is also known as
a reconfigurable intelligent surface, large intelligent surface,
and software-controlled meta surface [117]–[119]. IRS can
be explained clearly through the signal model and hardware
structure. The signal model of the IRS and the hardware
structure of the IRS have been explained in the following
subsections.
1) Signal model of IRS: IRS comprises several passive
reflecting units, each of which can flexibly alter the phase, am-
plitude, frequency, or even polarisation of incident signals [11].
IRS uses software-controlled reflection to set up the wireless
propagation environment, which results in a universal solution
to the problem of wireless channel fading impairment. This
leads to a significant advancement in the wireless channel’s
capacity and dependability. The link from BS to UE through
IRS contains three parts: BS to IRS link, IRSs reflection, and
IRS to UE link shown in Fig. 4. IRS consists 𝐿 (𝐿 > 1)
number of reflecting units (RUs). The amplitude and phase
shift coefficients of 𝑙 𝑡 ℎ RU are changed based on channel
conditions to cover the shadow area and enhance connection
strength, where 𝑙𝜖 {1, 2, ..., 𝐿}. The received signal at UE
through IRS is mentioned/ calculated as follows
!
𝐼
X𝐿
𝑗∅𝑙
𝜂
− 𝐵,𝑅
𝜂
− 𝑅,𝑈𝐸
𝑦 = 𝐺 𝑙 𝐴𝑙 𝑒 𝑔𝑙 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸
2 2
𝑠+𝑛
𝑙=1
 𝜂 𝜂

− 𝐵,𝑅 − 𝑅,𝑈𝐸
= 𝐺Θ𝑔𝑑 𝐵,𝑅2 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸2 𝑠+𝑛 (1)
where 𝑠 is transmitted signal by BS, 𝑛 is Additive white
Gaussian noise (AWGN) with zero-mean and variance = 𝜎𝑖2 .
To assist this study, 𝜎12 = 𝜎22 = 𝜎 2 and SNR (𝜌) = 𝜎𝑃2
is considered. 𝐴𝑙 and ∅𝑙 represent amplitude and phase
shift coefficients of 𝑙 𝑡 ℎ RUs.
 The reflection coefficients de-
noted by matrix, Θ = 𝑑𝑖𝑎𝑔 𝐴1 𝑒 𝑗∅1 , 𝐴2 𝑒 𝑗∅2 , .., 𝐴𝑙 𝑒 𝑗∅𝑙 , where
𝐴𝑙 𝜖 (0, 1) and ∅𝑙 𝜖 [0, 2𝜋]. To improve the performance, the
phase shift coefficients of IRS are optimized. The optimized
value is defined as [92]
∅𝑙∗ = −𝑎𝑟𝑔[𝑔𝑙 ] − 𝑎𝑟𝑔[𝐺 𝑙 ] (2)
Here 𝑎𝑟𝑔[.] gives the phase of the complex data. 𝐺 𝑙
indicates path from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆, 𝑔𝑙 indicates path from 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to
𝑈𝐸 for 𝑙 𝑡 ℎ RU. 𝐺 𝑙 = 𝑐 𝑙 𝑒 𝑗 𝜃𝑙 , ℎ𝑙 = 𝑢 𝑙 𝑒 𝑗 𝜓𝑙 , 𝑐 𝑙 and 𝑢 𝑙 denote am-
plitude coefficients and 𝜃 𝑙 and 𝜓𝑙 indicate phase coefficients of
the BS to IRS and IRS to 𝑈𝐸 respectively, these are changed
randomly according to the channel conditions. Particularly
they are 𝑔𝑙 = [𝑔1 , 𝑔2 , ..., 𝑔 𝐿 ] 𝑇 and 𝐺 𝑙 = [𝐺 1 , 𝐺 2 , ..., 𝐺 𝐿 ] 𝑇
as given in [121]. 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅 denotes the distance from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆
and 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸 denote distance from 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to 𝑈𝐸, 𝜂 𝐵,𝑅 denotes
path loss component from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 and 𝜂 𝑅,𝑈𝐸 denotes
path loss component from 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to 𝑈𝐸. Large-scale fading,
small-scale fading, and distance-related path loss are the main
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138

Paper organization

Section II: Section III:

Section I:
Concept and The performance of
Introduction
Structure IRS-assisted NOMA

A. Literature of IRS, A. IRS A. The performance analysis

NOMA and IRS-assisted
NOMA B. NOMA B. The performance optimization

B. Motivation C. IRS-assisted NOMA C. PLS measures

D. Channel estimation
C. Major contributions
D. Paper organization 1. Signal model of IRS
A. Green communication
2. Hardware structure of IRS
1. IRS B. Power constraint
2. NOMA 1. NOMA for downlink C. Coverage extension
3. IRS-assisted NOMA 2. NOMA for uplink D. Sum rate maximization

1. The evolution of IRS- E. Beamforming optimization

assisted NOMA
2. Downlink IRS-assisted F. Efficient resource utilization
NOMA
3. Uplink IRS-assisted NOMA

Section IV: Section V: Section VI:

Challenges of IRS- Section VII:
Applications of IRS- Future directions of
assisted NOMA Conclusion
assisted NOMA IRS-assisted NOMA

A. Beamforming design A. Multi-antenna-based A. ML and DL-based

B. Data transmission communication techniques
approaches B. UAV communication B. PLS
C. Channel modeling
C. THz communication C. Contrasting IRS-
D. Multiple IRS assisted OMA and NOMA
assignments D. MEC systems

E. Phase control E. D2D communication

F. Design
G. Deployment

Fig. 2: Paper organization

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Control Copper
circuit board back plane
IRS
IRS

S Lo IRS Controller
Lo S

X Reflecting
NLoS element
BS UE BS UE BS

BS IRS

Lo
S

Biasing Pin Metalic

Lo

S
IRS NLoS IRS line diode patch
BS
BS

Ra fadin
Fa
X

yle
st
igh g
On Stage

/
Rician/ Slow
S
Lo

Lo

UE fading
S

UE
Off Stage

Fig. 3: Main functions of IRS for wireless channel reconfigu- Fig. 5: Hardware structure of IRS [122]
ration [11]

difference of 𝜋 in rad [123]. "on" and "off" states of the PIN

ink
Sl k
- IR in
BS
W Nl
DO
X reflection amplitude between [0, 1]. Each element’s amplitude
NLoS
BS
Fig. 4: Signal model of IRS [120]
determinants of the 𝐺 and 𝑔 coefficients. RUs of the IRS
can autonomously rearrange themselves to reach the desired
performance by modifying these parameters.
2) Hardware structure of IRS: The hardware architecture
of IRS is shown in Fig. 5. The hardware implementation of
IRS is based on the idea of a "metasurface," which is made
of digitally programmable two-dimensional (2D) metamate-
rial [123]. The metasurface is a planar array comprising several
meta-atoms with electrical thicknesses on the order of the sub-
wavelength of the relevant operating frequency [124]. The sig-
nal output components can be improved by carefully planning
the components’ geometrical shape, such as a square or split-
ring, volume, direction, configuration, and other factors such as
reflected amplitude and phase shift. Each element’s reflection
coefficient in wireless communication applications should be
adjustable to accommodate dynamic wireless channels, and
positive-intrinsic-negative (PIN) diodes, field-effect transistors,
or micro-electromechanical system switches can be used to
perform this task. An individual elements structure is also
shown in Fig. 5, where a PIN diode is inserted in each element.
The PIN diode can be switched between "on" and "off" states
as shown in the equivalent circuits by adjusting its biasing
voltage via a DC feeding line and producing a phase-shift
diodes lead to different values of 𝜇 and 𝜖, as a result, various
IRS phase shifts and amplitude of IRS’s elements can be individ-
ually achieved by setting the appropriate biasing voltages by
IR the smart controller. Conversely, variable resistor load can be
S-
UE used in the element design to regulate the reflection amplitude
Lo lin effectively [125]. For instance, varying amounts of the energy
S k from the incident signal are dissipated depending on the
values of the resistors in each element, resulting in controlled
UE and phase shift are ideally controlled independently in practice.
Therefore, the aforementioned circuits must be effectively
integrated [125]. A typical IRS architecture comprises three
layers and an IRS controller, as shown in Fig. 5. Many metallic
patches (elements) are printed on a dielectric substrate in the
outer layer to interact with incident signals directly. The outer
layer is a 2D array of IRS elements that directly interacts with
incident signals. A copper plate is utilized behind this layer
to prevent signal energy leakage. The final component of the
inner layer is a control circuit board which is activated by a
smart controller. This controller is connected to the IRS and
charge of controlling the reflection amplitude/phase shift of
each element. Each IRS element is a low-cost sub-wavelength
programmable meta-material particle and may operate at fre-
quencies ranging from sub-6 (gigahertz) to (THz) [126]. A
current will be induced by the electromagnetic (EM) wave,
as an EM wave is inserted into the IRS element and based
on permittivity 𝜖 and permeability 𝜇 of the IRS, this induced
current will emit another EM radiation. In this way, the IRS
element controls the wireless signals. Field-programmable gate
array (FPGA) can be used in practice to build the controller
and serve as a gateway for low-rate information exchange
with other network components like BSs, access points (APs),
and UE terminals via independent wireless links. Even though
continuously adjusting the reflection amplitude and phase shift
of each IRS element is undoubtedly beneficial for communica-
tion applications. However, it is expensive since high precision
requires complex design and pricey hardware, which may not
be a scalable solution as the number of elements increases

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 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
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significantly. For example, four PIN diodes must be integrated
into each element to achieve the 16 levels of phase shift
as depicted in Fig. 5. The design of the IRS element is
challenging due to its small size, and the IRS element also
necessitates more regulating pins from the IRS controller to
excite a significant number of PIN diodes. Therefore, discrete
amplitude/phase shift levels that only require a few control
bits for each element are more cost-effective to implement for
practical IRSs. For instance, 1-bit for two-level (reflecting or
absorbing) amplitude control and/or two-level (0 or 𝜋) phase
shift control [123], [127].
B. NOMA
NOMA
Power
Power
........
........
Frequency Time/Frequency/Code
Fig. 6: NOMA vs OMA [128]
Resource utilization re-solves the problem of radio spectrum
scarcity, which is the major problem for the next-generation
wireless network, and MA techniques can undertake this
problem as they enable multiple UEs to share a single resource.
Cellular networks have been implementing OMA techniques
such as TDMA, frequency division multiple access (FDMA),
code division multiple access (CDMA), and OFDMA [129].
The first-generation, second-generation, third-generation, and
fourth-generation systems use FDMA, TDMA, CDMA, and
OFDMA, respectively [130]. These techniques are orthogonal
as they provide orthogonal access to the UEs by sharing the
same resource, either in time, frequency, code, or space. In
FDMA systems, information for each UE is assigned to the
frequency sub-slots. TDMA sends data to each UE in non-
overlapping time intervals. CDMA uses codes to divide UEs
on the same channel. Under OFDMA, components of subcar-
riers are allocated to UEs. In 5G and beyond, networks access
the same time/frequency resources, and a new framework is
used, namely NOMA. In NOMA, each UE accesses every
subcarrier. The spectrum sharing for two UEs using OMA
and NOMA is shown in Fig. 6. Both uplink and downlink
transmission are included in the idea. In NOMA to utilize the
same spectrum for all UEs, superposition coding is used at the
transmitter side, and SIC is used at the receiver side. The many
information signals are merged at the transmitter into a single
waveform, and the SIC decodes each signal separately until
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it finds the necessary signal. To analyze the performance of
UEs, two important parameters are generally used: achievable
data rate and outage probability, where achievable data rate
indicates the maximum number of bits transmitted over the
channel per second, and the outage probability defines that
the achievable data rate is less than the required targeted
achievable data rate. The highest achievable data rate and
lowest outage probability denote the best UE in the network.
First, SIC decodes the strongest signal, while others are
regarded as interference. If the signal decoding is successful,
the other signals are exactly obtained by removing the first
decoded signal from the received signal. Until it discovers
the desired signal, SIC repeats the process. UEs’ information
waveforms are separated based on the power levels provided
by the transmitter, and the methodology for power split for
OMA uplink and downlink channels is different. During the iteration
steps, the complete cancellation of the signals is essential for
the success of SIC.
Power
BS
........
....
....
Time/Frequency
Fig. 7: Downlink NOMA [131]
1) NOMA for downlink: The BS superimposes the in-
formation waveforms for its serviced customers during the
NOMA downlink, and each UE identifies its signals using
the SIC. In downlink NOMA, a BS and 𝐾 number of UEs
with SIC receivers is shown in Fig. 7. The identical signal,
which contains data of each UE in the system, is received by
every UE. Therefore, BS transmits the signal 𝑆, which can be
written as
√ √ √ √

𝑆 = 𝑃 𝛼1 𝑠 1 + 𝛼2 𝑠 2 + · · · + 𝛼 𝐾 𝑠 𝐾 (3)
where 𝑠𝑖 is own signal, 𝛼𝑖 is the power distribution component
of the total power 𝑃. where 𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾. 𝐾 is the total
number of UEs.
The power is allocated to the UEs according to the distance
of UEs from the BS. 𝑈𝐸 1 is the closest to the BS, so the least
power is allocated to the 𝑈𝐸 1 , whereas 𝑈𝐸 𝐾 is the farthest
P𝐾
one. Therefore, the highest power is required and 𝑖=1 𝑃𝛼𝑖 =
1. The nearest UE first decodes the other UE signals, then
subtracts these from the received signal by SIC to detect its
own signal, and the farthest UE directly decodes its own signal
with the presence of other UE signals as interferences. The
received signal of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 is as follows
 𝜂 𝐵,𝑈𝐸 
− 𝑖
𝑦 𝑖𝑑 = ℎ 𝐵,𝑖 𝑑 𝐵,𝑈𝐸2𝑖 𝑆 + 𝑛𝑖
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
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= 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 𝑆 + 𝑛𝑖 (4) 𝑛 represents noise at the BS. Based on the locations, the UEs
optimize their transmit powers in the uplink mode, which is
where 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 , indicates path of BS and 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 , and 𝑛𝑖 is the
the same as in the downlink mode. At the receiver side, the BS
AWGN at the 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 .
uses SIC, and the BS first treats far UEs’ signal as interference
When 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 decodes the signal of 𝑈𝐸 𝑝 where, 𝑖 =
and directly decodes the near UEs’ signal. Then BS subtracts
1, 2, · · · , 𝐾 − 1 and 𝑖 < 𝑝 ⩽ 𝐾, the signal-to-interference-
the near UEs’ signal from the received signal by SIC to detect
plus-noise ratio (SINR) can be written as follows [129]
the farthest UEs’ signal.
2
𝑑
𝛼 𝑝 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 When BS decodes the signal of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 , the SINR and data
𝛾𝑖→ 𝑝 = P 𝑝−1 2
(5) rate of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be written as (12) and (13) respectively.
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 +
1
𝜌
2
When 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 decodes its own signal, the SINR can be defined 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖
𝛾𝑖𝑢 = P 2
(12)
as 𝐾
2 𝑗=𝑖+1 𝐻 𝐵, 𝑗 + 1
𝜌
𝛼𝑖 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖
𝛾𝑖𝑑 = P (6)

𝑖−1
𝛼 𝑗 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 +
2 1 𝐼𝑖𝑢 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾𝑖𝑢 (13)
𝑗=1 𝜌
The data rate of the 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 for 𝑖 = 1 can be expressed by The outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be defined as
   \ 
𝐼1𝑑 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾1𝑑 (7) P𝑢𝑖 = 𝑃𝑟 𝛾𝑖𝑢 < 2𝛾˜𝑖 − 1 · · · 𝛾1𝑢 < 2𝛾˜1 − 1 (14)
Accordingly, the data rate of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 for 𝑖 = 2, · · · , 𝐾, where In OMA, for downlink and uplink, the data rate of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can
𝑖 > 𝑝 ≥ 1 can be expressed as [92] be given as
     2!
𝐼𝑖𝑑 = 𝑚𝑖𝑛 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾 𝑑𝑝→𝑖 , .., 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾𝑖𝑑 (8) 𝑜 1 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖
𝐼𝑖 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + (15)
𝐾 1
𝜌
The outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be written as, where
𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾 − 1 and 𝑖 < 𝑝 ⩽ 𝐾 In OMA, outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be defined as
 \ 

P𝑖𝑑 = 𝑃𝑟 𝛾𝑖→ 𝑑
𝑝 < 2 𝛾˜𝑝
− 1 · · · 𝛾 𝑑
𝑖 < 2 𝛾˜𝑖
− 1 (9) P𝑖𝑜 = 𝑃𝑟 𝐼𝑖𝑜 < 𝛾˜𝑖 (16)
The outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be defined as, where
𝑖=𝐾 C. IRS-assisted NOMA
 
𝑑 𝑑 It is clear from the previous discussion that IRS and NOMA
P𝐾 = 𝑃𝑟 𝛾𝐾 < 2𝛾˜𝐾 − 1 (10)
technology is a potential candidate to address the most chal-
lenging problems in future wireless networks. Therefore, it can
be said that in the 6G networks, combining IRS and NOMA
BS
network technologies can be the prominent framework for
reliable communication. The performance benefit of NOMA
Power

.... without an IRS network mainly relies on the two or more

....
UEs’ channel conditions, and traditionally, the propagation
........

environment of the UEs is the only factor that affects the

UEs’ channel conditions. The use of IRS creates the chance
for intelligently redesigning the UEs’ propagation environment
Time/Frequency for reliable communication in the NOMA network. IRS can
increase the design flexibility of NOMA networks, reduce
the limitations in multiple antenna-aided NOMA networks,
Fig. 8: Uplink NOMA [131] and change the nature of the NOMA network from channel
2) NOMA for uplink: NOMA uplink is implemented in condition-based to QoS-based. In this survey, the existing
a somewhat different than downlink implementation. In up- literature on IRS-assisted NOMA networks has already been
link, the UEs’ battery capacity restricts their transmit power. explained in section I-A3. Here, the evolution and working
Therefore, UEs can send with their maximum power. Fig. 8 operation of IRS-assisted NOMA for the downlink network
illustrates a framework that multiplexes 𝐾 UEs using NOMA and the uplink network are presented.
in the uplink, and at this instance, BS employs SIC to divide 1) The evolution of IRS-assisted NOMA: In wireless net-
the UE’s signals. In the uplink NOMA, the received signal of works, to enhance users’ performance, NOMA has been in-
the BS consists of all the user’s signals, and the signal can be tegrated with several other communication technologies, such
represented as follows as MIMO and relay. The IRS has been combined with OMA.
! Each strategy has some benefits and drawbacks that are empha-
𝑢
X𝐾
−
𝜂 𝐵,𝑈𝐸
𝑖
sized. Therefore, in this subsection, the IRS-assisted NOMA
𝑦 = ℎ 𝐵,𝑖 𝑑 𝐵,𝑈𝐸𝑖 𝑠𝑖 + 𝑛
2

𝑖=1 is compared with IRS-assisted OMA, relay with NOMA, and

X
𝐾 IRS-assisted NOMA with MIMO technologies. Further, the
= 𝐻 𝐵,𝑖 𝑆 + 𝑛 (11) importance of IRS-assisted NOMA in the context of existing
𝑖=1 technologies has been discussed.

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 2021Management.
This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service 12 This is254
the author's193 54has not been fully edited and
version which 14
2022DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: 9 288 226 105 21
2023 19 215 169 84 21
10

IRS is a new and disruptive technology to achieve spec- 350

trum, energy, and cost-efficient wireless networks where a BS 300 273286 288

No. of publications
254
250 226
transmits superposed downlink signals to multiple UEs. Some 215
193
research studies have been done on IRS-assisted OMA [132]– 200 164162 169
[134]. However, OMA does not provide low latency, high 150
105
100 84
spectral efficiency, and desired QoS as compared to NOMA. 54
50 7 12 9 19
Spectrum efficiency is an important parameter for reliable 3 18
0
communication in B5G or 6G wireless technology. Therefore, IRS with OMA Relay with MIMO with IRS with NOMA
to overcome these problems, the IRS with the NOMA network NOMA NOMA
has come into existence. On the other hand, in wireless 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
networks, the relay offers an additional approach to enhance
Fig. 9: The number of publications for IRS-assisted NOMA
performance [135]. In 5G and beyond wireless communica-
as per Scopus database
tion to enhance throughput and coverage, relay and NOMA
were used together [136]–[140]. However, the relay has more
hardware cost and needs more energy and power as the
relay consists of several active electronic components, such as hardware cost, less complexity, and high QoS.
digital-to-analog converters, analog-to-digital converters, low- 2) Downlink IRS-assisted NOMA: Here, the mathematical
noise amplifiers, and mixers. These problems can be overcome expressions of the downlink IRS-assisted NOMA network are
by IRS [122]. In [141], a comparison of the relay with IRS was presented. A downlink IRS-assisted NOMA-based wireless
presented where IRS with NOMA networks had less hardware network model is considered as depicted in Fig. 10.
complexity, low power, and low complexity than a relay-aided
network. IRS provides a smart wireless channel that enhances
the performance of wireless communication over a relay- IRS Controller
assisted network. Further, in wireless communication, new
UE requirements, applications, and networking features are

IR
ink

S-
required due to the rapid expansion of mobile devices [142]. Sl

U
Es
-IR

lin
Recently, there has been an increased interest in creating new BS

ks
transmission technologies that take advantage of the propaga-
X
tion environment’s inherent randomness to deliver high-speed
and seamless data services, such as spatial modulation [143] BS X
BS-U
Es lin
and massive MIMO technologies [144]. In wireless commu- ks

...
X
nication, MIMO technologies are used for multipath commu-
nication. MIMO multiplies the capacity of a UE or device to
send and receive signals at the same time. It achieves a higher
data rate, high spectrum efficiency, high QoS, low BER, and
Fig. 10: Downlink IRS-assisted NOMA-based framework
low fading. In 5G and B5G wireless communication, MIMO
is an important technology. Combining MIMO with NOMA is
a prominent technology as it provides reliable communication In this model, BS √simultaneously transmits the superim-

√ √ √
and enhances the high spectral efficiency, channel capacity, posed signal 𝑆 (𝑆 = 𝑃 𝛼1 𝑠1 + 𝛼2 𝑠2 + · · · + 𝛼𝐾 𝑠 𝐾 ) to
ergodic sum capacity, etc [145]–[148]. Some disadvantages the 𝑖 (𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾) number of NLoS UEs via IRS. Here, IRS
of the MIMO with NOMA system exist despite its benefits. consists of 𝐿 number of RUs and provides virtual LoS links
The resource requirements and hardware complexity of MIMO to the NLoS UEs for reliable communication. The received
with NOMA are high, and the hardware resources increase signal of the 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 is given as
power requirements and energy consumption. Along with this  𝜂 𝜂𝑅,𝑈𝐸 
𝑑 − 𝐵,𝑅 − 𝑖
in the MIMO network, it is challenging to arrange UEs as the 𝑦 𝐿,𝑖 = 𝐺Θ𝑔𝑖 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸2𝑖
2
𝑆 + 𝑛𝑖
MIMO devices have multiple antennas, and the UEs’ links
are represented as vectors or matrices. MIMO increases the = 𝐻𝑖 𝑆 + 𝑛𝑖 (17)
network’s complexity, hardware cost, power, and energy. These  
𝜂 𝐵,𝑅 𝜂𝑅,𝑈𝐸
− − 𝑖
limitations of the MIMO-based transmission can be solved
where, 𝐻𝑖 = 𝐺Θ𝑔𝑖 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅2 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸2𝑖 . 𝐻𝑖 is the effective
by using the IRS, as the IRS is less expensive and the IRS
has a lightweight profile. Therefore, the IRS-assisted NOMA channel gain from the BS to 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 by IRS where |𝐻1 | 2 ≥
network is a suitable candidate for a 6G wireless network. |𝐻2 | 2 · · · ≥ |𝐻𝐾 | 2 and 𝛼1 ≤ 𝛼2 · · · ≤ 𝛼𝐾 as 𝑈𝐸 1 is the closest
The chart in Fig. 9 exhibits the number of IRS with NOMA to the BS whereas 𝑈𝐸 𝐾 is the farthest one. 𝐺 indicates path
research articles over other research articles such as IRS with from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆, 𝑔𝑖 indicates path from 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 . 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅
OMA, relay with NOMA, and MIMO with NOMA. The indicates the distance from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 and 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸𝑖 indicates
publication data is as per the Scopus database. It can be distance from 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 , 𝜂 𝐵,𝑅 indicates path loss elements
noticed that over the years, the research interest in IRS-assisted from BS to 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 and 𝜂 𝑅,𝑈𝐸𝑖 indicates path loss elements from
NOMA networks has greatly increased as this network has low 𝐼 𝑅𝑆 to 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 .

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11

When 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 decodes 𝑈𝐸 𝑝 signal, where 𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾 − 1

and 𝑖 < 𝑝 ⩽ 𝐾, the SINR can be defined as IRS Controller

𝑑 𝛼 𝑝 |𝐻𝑖 | 2
𝛾 𝐿,𝑖→

U
𝑝 = P 𝑝−1 (18)

Es
k
|𝐻𝑖 | 2 + lin
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗

-
1

IR
𝜌 BS

S
-

lin
IRS

ks
When 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 decodes its own signal, the SINR can be written
as X
𝑑 𝛼𝑖 |𝐻𝑖 | 2
𝛾 𝐿,𝑖 = P𝑖−1 (19) BS UEs-
X
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 |𝐻𝑖 | 2 + 1
𝜌 BS li
nks
X

...
Then, the data rate of the 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 for 𝑖 = 1 can be define as
 
𝑑 𝑑
𝐼 𝐿,𝑖 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾 𝐿,𝑖
!
𝛼1 |𝐻1 | 2 Fig. 11: Uplink IRS-assisted NOMA-based framework
= 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 1
(20)
𝜌
 
The data rate of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 for 𝑖 = 2, · · · , 𝐾, where 𝑖 > 𝑝 ≥ 1 can 𝑢
𝐼 𝐿,𝑖 =𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾 𝑢𝐿,𝑖
be expressed as
     |𝐻𝑖 | 2
𝑑
𝐼 𝐿,𝑖 𝑑
= 𝑚𝑖𝑛 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾 𝐿, , .., 𝑙𝑜𝑔 𝛾 𝑑 © ª
𝑝→𝑖 2 1 + 𝐿,𝑖 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 ­1 + P 2
® (26)
𝐾
« 𝑗=𝑖+1 𝐻 𝑗 + 1
𝜌¬
2
© 𝛼𝑖 𝐻 𝑝 ª
= 𝑚𝑖𝑛 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 ­1 + P 2
®,··· The outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be defined as
𝑖−1  
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 𝐻 𝑝 +
1
« 𝜌 ¬ \
!! P𝑢𝐿,𝑖 =𝑃𝑟 𝛾 𝑢𝐿,𝑖 < 2𝛾˜𝑖 − 1 · · · 𝛾 𝑢𝐿,1 < 2𝛾˜1 − 1
𝛼𝑖 |𝐻𝑖 | 2
, 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + P𝑖−1 (21) \
|𝐻𝑖 | 2
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 |𝐻𝑖 | + 𝜌
2 1
= 𝑃𝑟 P 2
< 2𝛾˜𝑖 − 1
𝐾
For 𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾 − 1 and 𝑖 < 𝑝 ⩽ 𝐾, outage probability of 𝑗=𝑖+1 𝐻𝑗 + 1
𝜌
!
𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be mentioned as |𝐻1 | 2
  𝛾˜1
\ ··· P <2 −1 (27)
P𝑑𝐿,𝑖 =𝑃𝑟 𝛾 𝐿,𝑖→
𝑑 𝛾˜𝑝 𝑑 𝛾˜𝑖 𝐾 2
𝑝 < 2 − 1 · · · 𝛾 𝐿,𝑖 < 2 − 1 𝑗=2 𝐻𝑗 + 1
𝜌

𝛼 𝑝 |𝐻𝑖 | 2 \
= 𝑃𝑟 P 𝑝−1 < 2𝛾˜𝑝 − 1 III. T HE PERFORMANCE OF IRS- ASSISTED NOMA
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗
|𝐻𝑖 | 2 + 1
𝜌
! This section explains the performance of the IRS-assisted
𝛼𝑖 |𝐻𝑖 | 2 NOMA network. Firstly, the performance of the downlink and
· · · P𝑖−1 < 2𝛾˜𝑖 − 1 (22) uplink IRS-assisted NOMA network for achievable data rate
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 |𝐻𝑖 | +
2 1
𝜌 and outage probability has been presented through simulation
For 𝑖 = 𝐾, outage probability of 𝑈𝐸 𝐾 can be expressed as results. Then, performance optimization, PLS measures, and
  channel estimation are discussed and analyzed.
P𝑑𝐿,𝐾 = 𝑃𝑟 𝛾 𝐿,𝐾
𝑑
< 2𝛾˜𝐾
!
𝛼𝐾 |𝐻𝐾 | 2 𝛾˜𝐾 A. The performance analysis of downlink and uplink networks
= 𝑃𝑟 P𝐾 −1 <2 (23)
𝑗=1 𝛼 𝑗 |𝐻 𝐾 | + 𝜌
2 1
This subsection presents the performance analysis of down-
3) Uplink IRS-assisted NOMA: To get the knowledge of the link IRS-assisted NOMA and uplink IRS-assisted NOMA
uplink IRS-assisted NOMA framework, an uplink IRS-assisted networks. Here, two UEs have been considered to explain the
NOMA-based wireless network model is considered in Fig. 11. performance, i.e., 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . Here, 𝑈𝐸 1 is near from the
The received signal at the BS by 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 , where 𝑖 = 1, 2, · · · , 𝐾 BS, and 𝑈𝐸 2 is far from the BS. The simulation parameters
is given as such as the power allocation factor 𝛼1 = 0.2 and 𝛼2 = 0.8
! have been considered for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 respectively. The
𝑢
X𝐾 𝜂
− 𝐵,𝑅 −
𝜂 𝑅,𝑈𝐸
𝑖 parameters such as distance and path loss component from
𝑦𝑙 = 𝐺Θ𝑔𝑖 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸𝑖 𝑠𝑖 + 𝑛
2 2

𝑖=1
BS to 𝑈𝐸 1 , 𝑑 𝐵,𝑈𝐸1 = 20 m and 𝜂 𝐵,𝑈𝐸1 = 2.6 respectively.
Similarly, the distance and path loss component from BS to
X
𝐾
= 𝐻𝑖 𝑠 𝑖 + 𝑛 (24) 𝑈𝐸 2 , 𝑑 𝐵,𝑈𝐸2 = 60 m and 𝜂 𝐵,𝑈𝐸2 = 2.6 respectively. The
𝑖=1 distance and path loss component from BS to IRS, 𝑑 𝐵,𝑅 =
When BS decodes the signal of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 , the SINR and data rate 10 m and 𝜂 𝐵,𝑅 = 1.1, respectively. The distance and path loss
of 𝑈𝐸 𝑖 can be obtained as (25) and (26) respectively. component from IRS to 𝑈𝐸 1 , 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸1 = 15m and 𝜂 𝑅,𝑈𝐸1 = 1.1
respectively. Similarly, the distance and path loss component
|𝐻𝑖 | 2 from IRS to 𝑈𝐸 2 , 𝑑 𝑅,𝑈𝐸2 = 55m and 𝜂 𝑅,𝑈𝐸2 = 1.1 respectively.
𝛾 𝑢𝐿,𝑖 = P 2
(25)
𝐾 The other parameters such as, the target data rate 𝛾˜1 = 2
𝑗=𝑖+1 𝐻𝑗 + 1
𝜌

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12

bps/Hz, 𝛾˜2 = 1 bps/Hz and 𝐿 =2, 4 are considered. The OMA, NOMA, and OMA networks for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . For
amplitude of the RUs, 𝐴𝑙 = 0.9 is considered, and the phase outage probability (22) and (23) have been considered for
of the RUs, ∅𝑙 has been considered based on (2). The SNR 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 respectively. Fig. 13a and Fig. 13b present
ranges from 10 dB to 40 dB for every simulation. that the IRS-assisted NOMA network outperforms the IRS-
assisted OMA, NOMA, and OMA network for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2
7 3.5
respectively.
6 3

Achievable data rate (bps/Hz)

Achievable data rate (bps/Hz)

5 2.5
7
5

4 2 4.5 6

Achievable data rate (bps/Hz)

Achievable data rate (bps/Hz)
4
3 1.5
5
3.5

2 1
3 4

2.5
1 0.5
3
2
0 0
10 15 20 25 30 35 40 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 1.5 2
SNR(dB) SNR(dB)
1
1

(a) 𝑈𝐸 1 (b) 𝑈𝐸 2 0.5

0 0
10 15 20 25 30 35 40 10 15 20 25 30 35 40

Fig. 12: Achievable data rate performance of 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 SNR(dB) SNR(dB)

for downlink network. (a) 𝑈𝐸 1 (b) 𝑈𝐸 2

Fig. 14: Achievable data rate performance of 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2
100 100 for uplink network.
Outage probability

Outage probability

100 100
Outage probability

Outage probability
10-1

10-1

10 15 20 25 30 35 40 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
SNR(dB) SNR(dB) 10-1

10-1

(a) 𝑈𝐸 1 (b) 𝑈𝐸 2
Fig. 13: Outage probability performance of 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 for 10 15 20 25
SNR(dB)
30 35 40 10 15 20 25
SNR(dB)
30 35 40

downlink network. (a) 𝑈𝐸 1 (b) 𝑈𝐸 2

Fig. 12 presents an achievable data rate performance com- Fig. 15: Outage probability performance of 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 for
parison between downlink IRS-assisted NOMA, IRS-assisted uplink network.
OMA, NOMA, and OMA for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . To simulate,
the achievable data rate, (20) and (21) have been considered Fig. 14 presents an achievable data rate performance com-
for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 respectively. Fig. 12 shows that for all parison between uplink IRS-assisted NOMA, IRS-assisted
values of SNR, the IRS-assisted NOMA network outperforms OMA, NOMA, and OMA for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . Similarly,
the NOMA and OMA networks. From Fig. 12a, it has been Fig. 15 presents an outage probability performance compari-
observed that for 𝑈𝐸 1 , at a high value of SNR (above 30 dB son between uplink IRS-assisted NOMA, IRS-assisted OMA,
SNR for 𝐿 = 2 and above 24 dB SNR for 𝐿 = 4), the IRS- NOMA, and OMA for 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . To simulate, the
assisted NOMA network is superior to the IRS-assisted OMA achievable data rate, (26) has been considered for both 𝑈𝐸 1
network. For smaller values of SNR, IRS-assisted OMA is and 𝑈𝐸 2 . Similarly, for the outage probability, (27) has been
slightly better than IRS-assisted NOMA. This is because, in considered for both 𝑈𝐸 1 and 𝑈𝐸 2 . From Fig. 14 and Fig. 15, it
the NOMA concept, BS sends the superimposed signal to 𝑈𝐸 1 has been observed that 𝑈𝐸 2 provides better performance than
and 𝑈𝐸 2 . The 𝑈𝐸 1 first decodes 𝑈𝐸 2 ’s signal, then subtracts 𝑈𝐸 1 , as in an uplink network, the BS first decodes the 𝑈𝐸 1 s’
𝑈𝐸 2 ’s from the received signal by SIC to detect its own signal, signal with the presence of 𝑈𝐸 2 s’ signal as interference. Then,
therefore, a high value of SNR is required for 𝑈𝐸 1 in IRS- to detect 𝑈𝐸 2 s’ signal, BS subtracts the 𝑈𝐸 1 s’ signal from
assisted NOMA networks. From Fig. 12b, it has been seen the received signal using SIC. Therefore, the performance of
that for 𝑈𝐸 2 at the low value of SNR (up to 32 dB SNR for 𝑈𝐸 2 is better as 𝑈𝐸 1 sufferers from interference. It has also
𝐿 = 2 and up to 28 dB SNR for 𝐿 = 4), the IRS-assisted been seen that for all values of SNR, the IRS-assisted NOMA
NOMA network outperforms the IRS-assisted OMA network. network is superior to NOMA and OMA networks. Further,
At higher values of SNR, the data rate of 𝑈𝐸 2 for the IRS- it has been observed that the uplink IRS-assisted NOMA
assisted NOMA network becomes constant since 𝑈𝐸 2 directly network provided better performances at low SNR as the
decodes its own signal with the presence of 𝑈𝐸 1 signal as uplink has limited power. From Fig. 14a, it has been seen that
interference. for 𝑈𝐸 1 , up to 25 dB SNR IRS-assisted NOMA outperforms
Fig. 13 presents an outage probability performance com- the IRS-assisted OMA network. Then, the data rate of 𝑈𝐸 1
parison between downlink IRS-assisted NOMA, IRS-assisted becomes constant due to the interference. However, for 𝑈𝐸 2

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13

as shown in Fig. 14b, it has been observed that IRS-assisted
NOMA outperforms the IRS-assisted OMA network. This is
due to the non-availability of interference.
It can be observed from Fig. 15a that up to 25 dB SNR
for 𝑈𝐸 1 , the IRS-assisted NOMA network is superior to the
IRS-assisted OMA network. Then, the outage probability of
𝑈𝐸 1 becomes constant. From Fig. 15b, it has been seen that
for 𝑈𝐸 2 , the IRS-assisted NOMA network is superior to the
IRS-assisted OMA network. However, for 𝐿 = 4 after 38 dB
SNR, the outage probability becomes constant. This is due to
the limited power, which has been already discussed.
B. The performance optimization
In the NLoS region, the performance of the UEs inside a
network is degraded due to NLoS links from the BS to the
UEs. The IRS can increase the channel gain to balance the data
rate of all UEs. Ideally, UE fairness is increased, and channel
gain is improved by NOMA and IRS, respectively. In future
wireless communication networks, power consumption, energy
efficiency, and coverage area have been raised as the demand
for higher data rates for massively connected devices in IoT
has increased. In this section, the performance optimization
of the IRS-assisted NOMA network has been discussed based
on green communication, power constraint, coverage exten-
sion, sum rate maximization, beamforming optimization, and
efficient resource allocation [84], [87], [97], [149]–[152].
35
30
30
27
throughput and power consumption [149]. IRS does not need
extra energy-consuming hardware, so the IRS is a promising
solution to improve energy efficiency by increasing the data
rate at an equal/constant amount of energy consumption. IRS-
based networks can amplify and forward the signals without
additional power amplifiers since they can modify the phase
shift of the reflected signal by reflecting components. An
improved energy efficiency method was suggested in [9] that
met QoS requirements while phase shifts and transmission
power were optimized. In the MISO network, to maximize
energy efficiency, the separate data rate limitation and the total
transmission power cost were developed in [90]. In [103],
a centralized IRS-enabled NOMA-beamforming system was
presented to optimize the active beamforming and power
allocation coefficient of UEs at the transmitter in the first
stage and passive beamforming at IRS in the second stage to
maximize the energy efficiency of the network. The formula
for the MISO system’s energy efficiency maximization, which
took into consideration each data rate constraint and the overall
transmit power budget [90], is as follows
𝐼
Θ𝑚𝑎𝑥
𝑤1 𝑤2 P2 (28)
𝑖=1 ∥𝑤 𝑖 ∥ + 𝑃 𝑐
1 2
𝜂
where,
𝐼 ≥𝐼 , 𝑖 = 1, 2
P𝑖2 𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛2
𝑖=1 ∥𝑤 𝑖 ∥ ≤ 𝑃𝑚𝑎𝑥 (29)
0 ≤ 𝜃 𝑙 ≤ 2Π, 𝑙 = 1, 2, ....𝐿


𝐼 = 𝐼1 + 𝐼2 , 𝐼𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 = 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝛾𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 , 𝛾𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 = 2𝐼𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 − 1
and 𝑃𝑐 = 𝑃 𝑑 + 𝑃0 . 𝑤 𝑖 represents the beamforming vector,
27 26 27

𝐼𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 is the minimum data rate, 𝛾𝑖,𝑚𝑖𝑛 is the minimum SINR

25
No. of publications

21
20
14
15
12
10
5 3 3 4
1 1
0 1
0
Green Power constant
communication
2019
Fig. 16: The number of publications for different performance
optimization of IRS-assisted NOMA as per Scopus database
Due to the increasing popularity of the IRS, the number
of publications from 2019 to October 2023 based on the
above parameters of IRS-assisted NOMA network is shown
by the bar chart in Fig. 16. The graph of this network has
been represented concerning parameters green communication,
power constraint, coverage extension, sum rate maximization,
beamforming optimization, and efficient resource allocation.
From Fig. 16, it can be concluded that this network has become
an innovative and vital technique in wireless networks as well
as it will be one of the important topics for future research
problems.
1) Green communication: Green communication is also
termed as energy efficient communication [9], [153]. Energy
efficiency measures how much data can be transported using a
given energy quantity. In IRS-based networks, an optimization
method is important to achieve the highest energy efficiency
since this performance parameter is essential for balancing
for 𝑖 𝑡 ℎ 𝑈𝐸, 𝜂 represents the power amplifier efficiency with
10 10
𝜂𝜖 {0, 1}, 𝑃𝑐 is total transmit power, 𝑃 𝑑 is the dynamic
7 7
5
8
power consumption and 𝑃0 is the static power consumption.
Beamforming vector for the 𝑖 𝑡 ℎ 𝑈𝐸 is denoted by 𝑤 𝑖 , and the
2 1 2 2 3 1
0 0 1
Coverage Sum rate Beamforming Resource
phase shift range is specified by (28) and (29). The transmit
extension maximization optimization allocation
power is constrained to 𝑃𝑚𝑎𝑥.
2020 2021 2022 2023
2) Power constraint: In future wireless networks, power
constraint frameworks are also important for reliable commu-
nication. Power optimization can be done by jointly optimizing
the transmit beamforming vectors 𝑤 𝑖,𝑘 at the BS and reflection
coefficient vector ∅ at the IRS. The IRS phase shift matrix is
optimized to minimize the transmission power. To minimize
the transmit power, authors in [9], [85] optimized power
usage issues and presented viable solutions. In a conventional
communication scenario, it is challenging to guarantee quasi-
degradation because the propagation environments determine
the channels and cannot be reconfigured. To overcome this dif-
ficulty in [85], an IRS-assisted MISO-NOMA system was con-
sidered, where the wireless channels can be effectively tuned,
and to minimize transmission power, the beamforming vectors
and the IRS phase shift matrix were optimized. Furthermore,
the authors proposed an improved quasi-degradation condition
by using IRS, which can ensure that NOMA achieves the
capacity region with high possibility. In [154], authors studied
an IRS-empowered NOMA network to minimize the total
transmit power by jointly optimizing the beamforming vectors
at the BS and phase shift matrix at IRS, where the IRS was

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 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
capable of inducing desirable channel differences among the
users to enhance the performance of NOMA. To address the
unique challenges of highly coupled optimization variables and
non-convex quadratic constraints, the authors proposed an al-
ternating difference-of-convex method to solve the non-convex
bi-quadratically constrained quadratic problem. In [155], to
solve the joint optimization problem of power control at UEs
and phase shift at IRS, the relationship was mentioned between
the transmit power of each UE and the phase shift. Downlink
IRS-assisted NOMA system was considered in [156] to solve
the significant interference problem among UEs and reduce the
transmit power consumption of the base station with target
QoS. In an IRS-assisted NOMA-based multi-cluster MISO
network with transmission rate requirements at 2𝐾 UEs, the
total minimize power optimization problem was calculated
as [151]
𝐾 
X 
𝜙 𝑚𝑖𝑛
2 2
𝑤𝑖,𝑘 𝑤 𝑖,𝑐 + 𝑤 𝑖,𝑒 (30)
𝑖=1
such that
√ constraints based on the characteristics of reflection amplitudes


−𝑏 ± 𝑏 2 − 4𝑎𝑐
𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝑚𝑖𝑛 𝛾𝑖,𝑐 ≥ 𝑟 𝑖,𝑐 ∀𝑖𝜖 𝐾
2𝑎



𝑙𝑜𝑔2 1 + 𝑚𝑖𝑛 𝛾𝑖,𝑒 , 𝛾𝑖,𝑐 ≥ 𝑟 𝑖,𝑒 ∀𝑖𝜖 𝐾
where, 𝛾𝑖,𝑐 and 𝛾𝑖,𝑒 represent SINR of central UE 𝑈𝑖,𝑐 and
cell edge UE 𝑈𝑖,𝑒 in the 𝑖 𝑡 ℎ cluster, respectively. 𝑟 𝑖,𝑐 and 𝑟 𝑖,𝑒
indicate target data rates of 𝑈𝑖,𝑐 and 𝑈𝑖,𝑒 respectively.
3) Coverage extension: In conventional networks and
higher bandwidth ranges of 5G and 6G networks, it is chal-
lenging to guarantee that every device has uniform signal
coverage [157]. IRS implementation at the boundary can
boost communication, while NOMA offers more than one
UE connectivity that successfully expands coverage area. To
address the improving issues and to define the IRS stages for
optimizing the least UE’s SINR below an ideal linear precoder,
the work in [157] suggested a projected gradient approach.
The IRS can act as a passive relay to send signals to UEs by
being placed at the cell boundary or close to the dead zone
when the QoS of direct links between UEs and the BS are
unsatisfactory.
4) Sum rate maximization: For reliable communication,
sum rate maximization is an essential criterion for future wire-
less communication [158]. Under individual power constraints
to increase the total data rate of UEs, the considered problem
requires joint power control at the UEs and beamforming
design at the IRS [159]. The sum rate of legitimate UEs
is maximized by optimizing the transmit beamforming, the
jamming vector, and the IRS reflecting vector, satisfying the
quality of service requirement, the IRS reflecting constraint
and the SIC decoding condition. In [87], the authors presented
an IRS-assisted uplink NOMA system to increase UE’s sum
rate under individual power constraints. In [108], the authors
designed a novel multi-IRS-assisted downlink NOMA network
to enhance the system capacity and formulated the sum rate
maximization problem by optimizing reflection coefficients.
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14
5) Beamforming optimization: In 6G wireless communica-
tion, the major criteria are sum rate maximization and reliable
communication [160]. To meet the requirement, beamforming
optimization is an important criterion. The transmit beam-
forming, the jamming vector, and the IRS reflecting vector
are jointly optimized to maximize the sum rate of UEs, meet
QoS, the IRS reflecting constraint, and the SIC decoding
condition. In [161], the authors maximized the minimum
achievable rate over all locations in a specific area by jointly
optimizing the transmit beamforming at the BS as well as the
placement and reflective beamforming at the IRS. In [162], the
authors jointly optimized the transmit beamforming for both
the common and private messages at the AP of the system, the
reflecting beamforming of the two IRS, as well as the power
splitting coefficients and the individual common rates of all
UEs to maximize the minimum achievable rate of all UEs and
minimum energy. In [151], the authors investigated a downlink
MIMO-IRS-aided NOMA system to maximize the sum rate
of all UEs by jointly optimizing the active beamforming at
the BS and the passive beamforming at the IRS, subject to
SIC decoding rate constraints and IRS reflecting elements
(31) and phase shifts of the ideal and non-ideal IRS. In [163],
an IRS-assisted downlink NOMA network was considered to
enhance the total data rate of UEs. DRL was adopted to solve
(32) non-convex optimization problems to predict and optimally
tune the IRS phase shift matrices.
6) Efficient resource utilization: Efficient resource utiliza-
tion is the prime factor in future wireless communication
networks. In [164], the authors proposed a framework for
resource allocation in multi-cell IRS-aided NOMA networks
to enhance wireless service. To maximize the achievable
sum rate, the problem of joint UE association, subchannel
assignment, power allocation, phase shift design, and decoding
order determination were formulated. Also, at high frequen-
cies, achieving optimal beamforming is another task for IRS-
assisted NOMA networks. A novel IRS-assisted semi-grant-
free-NOMA transmission system was proposed in [165] to
satisfy the channel gain requirements for grant-based users
and grant-free users (GFUs). The dynamic optimization on the
sub-carrier assignment, power allocation for roaming GFUs,
amplitude control, and phase shift design for reflecting ele-
ments of the IRS was formulated to maximize the long-term
data rate of all GFUs. In [166], a long short-term memory
(LSTM)-based algorithm was first adopted for predicting UE
mobility. Secondly, a K-means-based Gaussian mixture model
(K-GMM) algorithm was proposed for UE clustering. Thirdly,
a deep-Q-network (DQN)-based algorithm was invoked for
jointly determining the phase shift matrix and power allocation
policy to enhance the total data rate of UEs. The capacity and
rate regions for both capacity-achieving NOMA and OMA
transmission schemes were characterized in [167] by jointly
optimizing the IRS reflection matrix and wireless resource
allocation under the constraints of a maximum number of
IRS reconfiguration times. In [168], the authors optimized
mobile terminals’ offloading delay and energy consumption
to realize the delay energy tradeoff in an IRS-assisted mobile
edge computing-NOMA network.
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
C. PLS measures
Wireless communications are less secure than conventional
ones due to the broadcast nature of radio transmissions, and it
is challenging to ensure a reasonable secrecy rate for the multi
UEs NOMA network as the low-quality channels exist from
a BS to some of the legitimate UEs compare to the wiretap
channel from the BS to the ED [169]. In NOMA networks,
IRS enhanced wireless communication safety, privacy, and
PLS [170]. PLS ensures that only legitimate UEs can success-
fully decode the data, and PLS does not need secret keys and
complicated encryption processes [171]. From a theoretical
point of view, by adding IRS and efficiently designing the
passive beamforming, the UEs signals of the reflected and
direct paths were constructively added, but the eavesdropper
(ED) signals were destructively added [172], [173]. The BS
received the signals from the two UEs via IRS, where the
elements of the IRS were adjusted in such a way to ensure
that the signal connections of the UEs interfered completely
at the ED, but they did not at the BS [174].
D. Channel estimation
To detect signals, channel estimation is the most essential
part of a wireless communication system for the IRS. IRS has
limited transmitting, receiving, and signal processing capabil-
ities but it has a large number of elements as a result, channel
estimation is a challenging task for the IRS. IRS improved
the capacity and reliability of a wireless communication sys-
tem [175] by smartly reconfiguring the wireless propagation
environment, and to achieve this, the acquisition of CSI was
important. Practically, it is difficult as neither transmit nor
receive radio-frequency chains are present in IRS and have
limited signal processing capability. For IRS-aided multi-user
systems, the existing channel estimation approach mainly
consists of three phases: the first phase denotes direct channels
from the BS to the UEs, the second phase represents the
reflected link from the BS to a typical UE through the IRS, and
in the third phase, the reflected channels are estimated sequen-
tially based on the estimation results of the previous phases.
The channel estimation errors in the first and second phases
will reduce the estimation performance in the second and
third phases for serious propagation error issues. This problem
can be solved by a 2-phase-channel-estimation strategy, which
can reduce the adverse effects caused by error propagation
and increase the channel estimation performance. However,
in these networks, many RUs are required for channel esti-
mation [176]. In the existing channel estimation approach of
this network, only one unit is activated at a time, which can
be done by an on/off switch. Such an on/off-based channel
estimation scheme is more costly for a large number of RUs of
these networks. In [177], the authors produced a method that
provided better performance than the on/off-based method.
The authors also designed some efficient signal processing
methods for channel estimation [178], [179].A novel twin IRS
structure consisting of two IRS planes with a relative spatial
rotation was considered in [180]. The research work in [180],
training was transferred from UE to BS via IRS. It was a
third-order canonical polyadic tensor with a maximum tensor
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15
rank equal to the number of IRS unit cells. Then, four designs
of IRS training coefficients were considered to evaluate the
corresponding uniqueness conditions of channel estimation,
such as random, structured, grouping, and sparse patterns. The
work in [181] implemented in double IRS-aided single UE-
single input multiple output systems for channel estimation
problems. It first calculated the linear minimum-mean square
error (MSE) channel estimates of all links, then optimized the
parameters of both IRSs to reduce the channel estimation sum
MSE and projected gradient descent framework, exploiting
channel spatial correlations as side information. On the other
hand, NOMA uses SIC to detect the signals at the perfect
CSI, and signal detection can be easily implemented by using
SIC. Most of the works are based on the perfect CSI, while
a few works are based on imperfect CSI was reported. The
performance of the OMA and the NOMA system significantly
reduced in the presence of channel estimation error had been
presented in [182].
IV. C HALLENGES OF IRS- ASSISTED NOMA
The rewarding rise in network performance felicitated by
IRS-assisted NOMA also brought new difficulties and chal-
lenging research issues. Therefore, this section highlights a
few challenges associated with IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
A. Beamforming design
In IRS-assisted NOMA networks, beamforming is another
essential factor that depends on CSI to enable communica-
tion. Usually, codebook-based beamforming is considered to
minimize the training overhead and interference for reliable
communication. The codebook is updated based on the CSI
data in the codebook-based beamforming methods. In IRS-
assisted NOMA networks, these methods cannot be performed
efficiently due to the fluctuating CSI. Therefore, optimized
prediction techniques are desirable, which can predict the
future CSI depending on current codebook data. Further,
jointly optimizing the active and passive beamforming in IRS-
assisted NOMA networks is challenging.
B. Data transmission approaches
In an IRS-assisted NOMA network, a practical and syn-
chronized data transmission approach is needed for the IRS
to send data to the active BS or the active UEs. The IRS
uses this data to estimate the channel. However, the passive
IRS requires extra energy to decode the data of active BS or
active UEs. The energy-efficient data transmission approach
can be possible when it operates on low power. On the other
hand, this network has a user-based power allocation scheme at
the transmitter. However, a dynamic power allocation scheme
is needed to achieve the best performance, which is more
costly. Therefore, the energy-efficient and power-efficient data
transmission approach is another challenging task for IRS-
assisted NOMA networks to decode data of the BS or the
UEs.
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
C. Channel modeling
IRS is generally made of a large number of reflecting units.
BS models the user’s channel based on distances and path loss
components of the users. In multi-IRS scenarios, BS accesses
more users at a time. The amplitude and phase, along with
the number of RUs, are adapted as per the channel conditions.
Moreover, in the presence of different fading effects and
multipath propagation in dense networks, it becomes more
crucial. Therefore, channel modeling is quite challenging for
IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
D. Multiple IRS assignments
In future wireless communication, IRS-assisted NOMA
networks can be designed by distributed IRS with individual
RUs for more than one UE. In this scenario, controlling
each RU individually for distributed IRS will become another
challenging task for IRS controller. This will result in more
complex channel estimation, performance optimization, and
time allocation to access more UEs in dynamic wireless
channels. On the other hand, in this network, each BS can in-
dividually adapt its operating parameters based on the channel
condition. However, in wireless networks, the adaptability of
the IRS is adjustable and dynamic. Therefore, an IRS-assisted
NOMA network needs a joint control approach to access more
UEs simultaneously.
E. Phase control
In the IRS-assisted NOMA network, the phase of each
RU of the IRS is coordinated for effective beam generation.
In [183], [184], flexible phase tuning is achieved by a large
number of RUs of the IRS, where each RU is shifted by a
limited phase shift. However, the flexibility of this network
enhances the cost to cover more UEs. An efficient algorithm is
needed in dynamic wireless channels to control the phase shifts
of all RU. In this network, channel estimation and efficient
phase control become difficult with the large size of RU of
the IRS. On the other hand, the phase shift of the RU of
the IRS is strongly connected with the BS. Therefore, it is a
very challenging task for the IRS-assisted NOMA network to
design an efficient phase control mechanism with the lowest
adequate energy and communication costs.
F. Design
In communication, the IRS is practically difficult to fabri-
cate since higher resolution RUs are needed to fabricate the
IRS. Therefore, more complex hardware designs are required
to fabricate an IRS-assisted network. Suppose, for one exam-
ple, at least 4 PIN diodes are needed to activate 16 levels of
phase shifts of each RU, 𝑙𝑜𝑔2 16 = 4. This design is more
complex and challenging because of the limited size capacity
of the IRS. Along with this, to control these, the IRS controller
also requires more controlling pins. In IRS, a multi-level phase
can also be achieved using a single varactor diode, but a single
varactor diode needs high biasing voltages, which is more
expensive to fabricate. On the other hand, practically more
RUs are needed to enhance the performance of IRS-assisted
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16
networks. In [185], the authors presented that at least 112
RUs are needed to achieve 10−4 average bit error probability
in the IRS-aided extended 𝜂 − 𝜇 fading model. Therefore, large
RUs-based IRS-assisted NOMA network design is challenging
for cost-efficient wireless networks. Moreover, the design of
an active IRS is more difficult as an active IRS amplification
circuit is to be designed.
G. Deployment
IRS-assisted NOMA networks can be used for coverage
extension, which totally relies on the deployment of the IRS
and the performance of the IRS. Therefore, deployment of the
IRS is becoming an essential and challenging task for these
networks. Further, multiple numbers of IRSs are required for
wireless communication to enhance its performance. There-
fore, cost-efficient deployment of IRSs is necessary, which
is another challenging task for IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
Moreover, the deployment of the IRS depends on other factors,
such as the size of the IRS and the place where the IRS is
placed. With a large number of RUs, the size of the IRS
gradually increased. The optimal deployment of these IRSs
becomes difficult and complex.
V. A PPLICATIONS OF IRS- ASSISTED NOMA
In wireless communication, an IRS-assisted NOMA net-
work can be used for different scenarios. In this section, the
main applications of IRS-assisted NOMA are explained.
A. Multi-antenna-based communication
In wireless communication, multiple antennas can be used to
get multiplexing gain, diversity gain, and antenna gain, which
enhances the bit rate, error performance, and SINR of wire-
less systems, respectively. However, multiple antenna-based
communication increases the complexity, size, and hardware
cost. The IRS can overcome these as the IRS is a flexible and
lightweight profile with low hardware costs. The IRS provides
smart wireless channels that can enhance the performance
of communication. IRS was added with the multi-antenna
system for reliable communication in [92], [186]–[188]. On
the other, the IRS-assisted NOMA network can be used in
multi-antenna-based systems to achieve better performance.
In [189], a downlink IRS-aided NOMA network was proposed
for mm-wave massive MIMO with lens antenna array, i.e.,
IRS-aided mm-Wave beamspace NOMA to solve the power
leakage problem in beamspace channel and the per antenna
power constraint. However, multi-antenna-based IRS-assisted
NOMA networks suffer from interference. These networks
are costly and difficult to manage. These are the challenging
tasks of multi-antenna-based IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
Apart from these, there is not enough study being done based
on these topics, such as modulation classification, channel
estimation, and resource allocation for multi-antenna-based
IRS-assisted NOMA network, to maximize the performance of
users in multi-antenna-based IRS-assisted NOMA network and
to use multi-antenna-based IRS-assisted NOMA network for
green communication. These are some opportunities to move
forward based on open research problems.
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
B. UAV communication
Wireless communication systems accessed by UAVs offer
an efficient alternative and overcome the physical limitations
of conventional terrestrial wireless systems [190], [191]. In
particular, by taking the UAV’s high mobility, the communica-
tion performance can be enhanced by flying the UAV close to
the desired consumers. Additionally, as the UAV’s operational
height climbs, the likelihood that it will be able to see the
intended ground UEs increases, making it easier to establish a
reliable communication link. As a result, academia and indus-
try have given UAV-enabled wireless communications consid-
erable attention in which UAVs act as airborne relays [192]
and base stations [193]. As the UEs continuously travel, it is
challenging for the UAV framework to adjust to their frequent
movement. Another challenge of the UAV framework is the
battery capacity limits the performance of UAV frameworks.
To overcome these challenges, the IRS is used in UAV-based
communication. A stable connection through UAVs and multi-
UEs can be made possible by the IRS’s ability to change phase
shifts. To maximize the possible rate of the UEs, the three-
sided UAV location, IRSs reflected rays, and UE connection
must all be designed together. Additionally, extra channel
conditions and QoS-based decoding order design must be
considered to leverage the NOMA capabilities properly. This
result is a challenging task to join NOMA, UAV location,
and reflected waves of IRSs. These structural models were
emphasized in [107] where the average total system energy
consumption was minimized by jointly designing the resource
allocation strategy, the 3D trajectory of the UAV as well as
the phase control at the IRS. In [194], an IRS-based UAV-
assisted MIMO-NOMA downlink network was designed to
maximize the rate of the strong UE. In [195], the authors
present a review on IRS-assisted UAV communications, where
IRS-assisted UAV communications provided limited outcomes
as IRS-assisted NOMA-based UAV communication has not
been considered to improve the performance of wireless
communication. However, IRS-assisted NOMA-based UAV
networks suffer from channel estimation problems, high power
consumption, varying locations, and dynamic environments.
These are the challenging tasks in IRS-assisted NOMA-based
UAV networks. Currently, there are limited studies being done
on this.
C. THz communication
Research in academia has shown a lot of interest in the
THz range due to its wide bandwidth. The usable bandwidth
of the THz band is significantly larger than that of mm-
wave communications [196] in the frequency range of 0.1
THz to 10 THz with a narrow beam. Additionally, the 6G
mobile communication networks were built based on the THz
communications [197]. The challenge of the THz band is
that it covers a small area. As a result, there will be a
significant transmission load and a large energy consumption.
Also, due to high frequencies, a small number of possible
propagation channels decreases the identification and detection
efficiency. These challenges can be controlled by using IRS
and NOMA in THz band-based communication. The THz
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17
band-based NOMA systems can improve extensive connec-
tivity, spectrum efficiency, and higher average data rates. The
energy-efficient resource allocation mechanism for THz-based
downlink NOMA systems was provided in [198]. On the other
hand, IRS with THz-based communication created a smart ra-
dio environment and specifically solved the problem in NLoS
communication scenarios [199]. In [200], IRS and THz-based
communication was presented. Here, IRS and THz-based
communication produced a reconfigurable and programmable
communication environment. NOMA-based IRS-assisted THz
communication network was investigated in [201], [202].
THz-based IRS-assisted NOMA networks enhance the multi-
user performance. As a result, these networks suffer from
multi-user interference, which is difficult to control. Also,
these networks suffer from the loss of information during
long-distance communications in dense networks, which are
challenging tasks in THz-based IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
In addition to these studies, the IRS with THz network using
the NOMA framework has excellent research potential.
D. MEC systems
MEC is a key technology in wireless communication. It
enhances computation capacity with minimum computing re-
sources and low battery. It can also reduce energy use and
operation delay time. However, in wireless communication,
when a channel is not working properly, the advantages of
MEC can not be harnessed. IRS-assisted NOMA can enhance
the channel performance in MEC, thus improving the energy
and spectrum efficiency of the network. Therefore, IRS-
assisted NOMA is a key technology for the MEC network.
In [203], the authors proposed algorithms to minimize the
latency of the IRS-NOMA-MEC systems. In [204], the au-
thors proposed energy efficiency-based algorithms for IRS-
assisted NOMA-aided MEC systems. In [205], the authors
derived the user’s outage probability expression to present the
efficacy of the IRS-aided cooperative NOMA-MEC system.
In [102], the authors jointly optimized power, frequency,
beamforming, and phase shift matrix efficiency to maximize
the energy efficiency of the IRS-assisted NOMA-based MEC
networks. However, IRS-assisted NOMA-based MEC systems
are impacted by phase control problems of IRS, beamforming
designing problems, and imperfect SIC of NOMA networks.
However, there isn’t enough study being done on IRS-assisted
NOMA-based MEC systems, such as sum rate maximization,
energy consumption minimization, channel estimation, and
resource allocation of the IRS-assisted NOMA-based MEC
systems. These are possibilities for advancement, according
to unresolved research issues.
E. D2D communication
In communication, D2D is a promising technology. It can
enhance spectrum efficiency, enhance network connectivity,
and minimize the latency of the communication [206]–[208].
However, in D2D communication, the co-channel interfer-
ence is increased due to many D2D equipment. Therefore,
to overcome the above problem, NOMA can be applied in
D2D communication to minimize the interference by SIC.
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
Moreover, NOMA-based D2D communication also enhances
the security and spectrum efficiency of the network [209].
The important issue in D2D communication is the direct link
between the transmitter and receiver, which is blocked by
obstacles. This challenge can be solved by the IRS [210].
In [211], the authors proposed a resource allocation approach
for IRS-assisted NOMA-based D2D communication. In [212],
the authors derived the achievable rates and outage prob-
abilities performance of users in IRS-aided NOMA-based
D2D communication. However, IRS-assisted NOMA-based
D2D communication also suffers from the channel estimation
problem, phase control by multiple IRS, and PLS, which
are challenging tasks in these networks. Along with these
studies, the IRS-assisted NOMA-based D2D communication
has great research capabilities. In the NLoS area, to enhance
the performance of UEs, IRS-assisted NOMA-based D2D
communication can be considered.
VI. F UTURE DIRECTIONS OF IRS- ASSISTED NOMA
This section elaborates on a few significant research areas
that can be taken to reveal outstanding potential advantages of
IRS-assisted NOMA network. This section elaborates on a few
significant future directions of IRS-assisted NOMA networks
for wireless communication.
A. ML and DL-based techniques
The RUs of IRS are optimized according to the channel
condition as a result, the performance of UEs is improved.
The conventional optimization techniques are very complex
as the number of RUs of the IRS is large. To overcome the
above problem, ML-based optimization techniques are being
considered. Several research works such [213]–[215] are avail-
able on different ML and DL-based techniques for optimizing
the different coefficients of IRS to improve the performance.
In [166], an LSTM algorithm was adopted for predicting the
mobility of UEs, a K-GMM algorithm was proposed for UE
clustering, and a DQN-based algorithm was invoked for jointly
determining the phase shift matrix and power allocation policy
to maximize the sum rate for UEs in the IRS with NOMA
networks. In [216], a long-term the stochastic optimization
problem was formulated, which involved a joint optimization
of NOMA UE partitioning and IRS phase shifting to maximize
the sum data rate of the mobile UEs in NOMA downlink
networks. Additionally, other learning-based techniques can
be investigated to create effective, low-complexity methods to
enhance the performance of the IRS so that the research field
becomes potentially fruitful. However, in ML and DL-based
algorithms, large data sets are needed to perform the operation,
but in wireless communication, a small data set is generated as
it is uncertain. Therefore, designing ML and DL-based tech-
niques in IRS-assisted NOMA networks is a challenging task
in future wireless communication. FPGA may be programmed
through ML or DL methods in future studies. Furthermore,
modulation classification may be carried out based on ML
or DL concepts for IRS-assisted NOMA networks. ML-based
methods such as transfer learning, Q-learning, and federated
learning mechanisms may be employed. The performance of
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18
this network is expected to improve with ML or DL-based
algorithms.
B. PLS
In wireless communication, due to the broadcast nature of
wireless transmission, the issue of PLS attracted widespread
interest [217], [218]. The challenges of PLS for massive
MIMO techniques, millimeter-wave (mm-wave) systems, and
heterogeneous networks were explored in [219] along with its
benefits and drawbacks. In the literature [171], [220]–[222],
several articles on PLS for NOMA networks were presented
and [223]–[226] described the PLS for IRS networks. This
also raises an important problem for IRS and NOMA networks
to achieve secure transmission. The PLS of the downlink in
IRS with NOMA networks were presented in [227], where
an ED was presented, and an IRS was deployed to enhance
the quality of the UE. An IRS-based PLS mechanism was
proposed in [228], which mitigated the information leakage
risk inherent in NOMA. The IRS-assisted NOMA networks are
still in the early stages of ensuring confidentiality, such as en-
hancing PLS for IRS-assisted NOMA networks in mm-wave,
securing massive IRS-assisted MIMO-NOMA networks with
artificial noise, and PLS of IRS-assisted MIMO-NOMA-based
cognitive radio network over imperfect CSI, etc. However, PLS
is more difficult for imperfect SIC-based IRS-assisted NOMA
networks. Further, managing the interference in these networks
is another problem that is increased by the co-channel interfer-
ence. Therefore, there are ample opportunities to implement
several security techniques in IRS-assisted NOMA networks.
C. Contrasting IRS-assisted OMA and NOMA
In [132], the performance of IRS-assisted OMA and NOMA
downlink communication systems was proposed, where trans-
mit power minimization problems were formulated for discrete
unit-modulus reflection constraints on each RU. To enhance
the coverage of a cell edge UE device and BS, IRS-aided
NOMA and OMA networks for both downlink and uplink
scenarios were studied in [229]. The achievable data rate
and outage probability performance of IRS-assisted OMA
and IRS-assisted NOMA networks have been presented in
section III-A. Here, the fixed amplitude of RUs and the
optimized phases of RUs have been considered. Therefore,
in IRS-assisted OMA and NOMA networks, the optimized
amplitude of RUs can be considered in the future. The other
performance, such as BER, throughput, and fair ratio, can
be considered in the future. Further, IRS-assisted NOMA
and IRS-assisted OMA can be differentiated by explaining
beamforming structure, signal detection technique, modulation
classification, and hardware structure. So, future research is
needed to explore the potential of these techniques.
In wireless communication, obstacles enhance the shadow
area. Therefore, to cover the shadow area and to enhance users’
performance under this, the IRS is being employed. The IRS-
assisted NOMA network is a recent paradigm in 6G wireless
communication to achieve these goals. This paper presented a
comprehensive survey on IRS-assisted NOMA networks. Here,
the basic concept and importance of the IRS-assisted NOMA
 This article has been accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management. This is the author's version which has not been fully edited and
content may change prior to final publication. Citation information: DOI 10.1109/TNSM.2023.3348138
in wireless communication have been explained. Along with
this, related work of IRS-assisted NOMA networks has been
described. From this work, it can be found that the researchers
have made initial efforts to shape the IRS-assisted networks
with different existing technologies. However, there are a lot
of challenges and future scopes to bring it to the deployment
stage. The significant challenges of this network lie in the
active IRS design that can controlled at the BS as per the
channel conditions. This needs extensive research into the
reconfigurability of the meta-materials and meta-surfaces at
THz. The efficient DL/ML-based signal processing algorithms
can be developed for the IRS controller, which will be soft-
ware plus hardware co-design. This survey further highlights
research challenges in each section and discusses the future
directions with suggested applications.
VII. C ONCLUSION
The paper provides a comprehensive survey of IRS, NOMA,
and IRS-assisted NOMA-based networks. The conceptual
frameworks of IRS, NOMA, and IRS-assisted NOMA-based
networks have been discussed in detail. The evolution of
IRS-assisted NOMA and its importance in 6G wireless com-
munication has been presented. Further, this work provides
mathematical expressions of the IRS-assisted NOMA networks
for better understanding. Along with these, achievable data rate
and outage probability performance analysis of IRS-assisted
NOMA, IRS-assisted OMA, NOMA, and OMA networks have
been represented by simulation outcomes. These simulations
provide a comparative analysis with a basic understanding of
downlink and uplink IRS-assisted NOMA networks. More-
over, a detailed analysis of optimization strategies, the PLS,
and channel estimation strategy with their advantages are
presented for IRS-assisted NOMA networks. This work also
illustrated a few challenges of IRS-assisted NOMA networks,
such as beamforming designing, data transmission approaches,
channel modeling, multiple IRS assignments, phase control,
design, and deployment. Further, this paper presented the
applications of IRS-assisted NOMA in multi-antenna-based
communication, UAV communication, THz communication,
MEC systems, and D2D communication. Finally, it provided
the future scope of IRS-assisted NOMA networks for dif-
ferent aspects such as ML and DL-based techniques, PLS,
and contrasting IRS-assisted OMA and NOMA. With these
challenges and future scopes, it can be concluded that IRS-
assisted NOMA networks have a pivotal role in suggested
applications. In the future, these research opportunities can
be explored by researchers to design robust and resilient 6G
wireless networks.
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