Radio access technology

{{Short description|Physical connection method for a radio communication network}}

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

The term RAT was traditionally used in mobile communication network interoperability.

{{cite book

|author1=I. Virtej |author2=S. Hamiti |author3=T.A. Rantalainen |author4=J. Parantainen |author5=G. Sebire |author6=E. Nikula |title=IEEE 54th Vehicular Technology Conference. VTC Fall 2001. Proceedings (Cat. No.01CH37211) |chapter=Radio resource control for GSM/EDGE Radio Access Network (GERAN)-inter radio access technology and inter-mode procedures

|volume=3 |pages=1417–1421 |date=November 2001

|doi=10.1109/VTC.2001.956430 |isbn=0-7803-7005-8 |s2cid=9731093 }}

More recently, the term RAT is used in discussions of heterogeneous wireless networks.S. O. Holland, A. Aijaz, F. Kaltenberger, F. Foukalas, G. Vivier, M. Buczkowski and S. Pietrzyk"[https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/7565257

Management architecture for aggregation of heterogeneous systems and spectrum bands ]." IEEE Communications Magazine ( Volume: 54 , Issue: 9, Sep. 2016, pp. 112–118. The term is used when a user device selects between the type of RAT being used to connect to the Internet. This is often performed similar to access point selection in IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) based networks.

{{cite web

|url=https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6582798

|author1=Melhem El Helou |author2=Samer Lahoud |author3=Marc Ibrahim |author4=Kinda Khawam |title=A Hybrid Approach for Radio Access Technology Selection in Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

|work=19th European Wireless Conference -Proceedings

|format=PDF

|date=April 2013

|accessdate=2013-10-07

|archiveurl = http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/articleDetails.jsp?tp=&arnumber=6582798 |archivedate = 7 October 2003 }}