Deep Learning in Physical Layer Communications

Deep learning (DL) has shown the great potentials to break the bottleneck of communication systems. This article provides an overview on the recent advancements in DL-based physical layer communications. DL can improve the performance of each individual block in communication systems or optimize the whole transmitter/receiver. Therefore, we categorize the applications of DL in physical layer communications into systems with and without block structures. For DL-based communication systems with block structures, we demonstrate the power of DL in signal compression and signal detection. We also discuss the recent endeavors in developing end-to-end communication systems. Finally, the potential research directions are identified to boost the intelligent physical layer communications with DL.