Autonomous Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface based on Highly-Efficient Solar Cells

The power consumption of reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS) has not been addressed enough in the state-of-the-art. This paper proposes a paradigm for converting RISs into eco-friendly structures that generate their needed power by the high-efficiency multiple junctions (MJ) solar cells. This work considers the impact of adding solar cells to the RIS and investigates the amount of generated power. Moreover, the inclination angle of the solar irradiance is considered as well as the needed batteries and DC-DC converters. Since the introduced RIS can be a potential candidate for the 5G-and-beyond-communications, two ranges of frequencies will be discussed in this work: sub-6GHz and 5G Millimeter wave (mmWave).