The advances in the automotive industry with the ever-increasing request for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs) are pushing for a new epoch of networked wireless systems. Vehicular communications, or Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X), are expected to be among the main actors of the future beyond 5G and 6G networks. However, the challenging application requirements, the fast variability of the vehicular environment, and the harsh propagation conditions of high frequencies call for sophisticated control mechanisms to ensure the success of such a disruptive technology. While traditional Radio Access Networks (RAN) lack the flexibility to support the required control primitives, the emergent concept of Open RAN (O-RAN) appears as an ideal enabler of V2X communication orchestration. However, how to effectively integrate the two ecosystems is still an open issue. In this paper, we discuss possible integration strategies, highlighting the challenges and opportunities of leveraging ORAN to enable real-time V2X control. Additionally, we enrich our discussion with potential research directions stemming from the current state-of-the-art and we provide preliminary simulation results that validate the effectiveness of the proposed integration.

翻译：汽车工业的进步与对网联自动驾驶汽车（CAVs）日益增长的需求，正推动无线网络系统迈入新时代。车载通信，即车联网（V2X），预计将成为未来5G-Advanced及6G网络的核心应用之一。然而，严苛的应用需求、车载环境的快速变化以及高频段恶劣的传播条件，要求复杂的控制机制来保障这一颠覆性技术的成功实施。传统无线接入网（RAN）因缺乏灵活性而难以支持所需的控制原语，而新兴的开放式无线接入网（O-RAN）概念则成为实现V2X通信编排的理想赋能者。然而，如何有效融合这两个生态系统仍是一个开放性问题。本文探讨了可能的集成策略，重点分析了利用O-RAN实现实时V2X控制所面临的挑战与机遇。此外，我们基于当前研究前沿拓展了潜在的研究方向，并提供了初步仿真结果，验证了所提集成方案的有效性。