xTRUCE: A Provably Safe Arbiter for Multi-xApp Conflict Mitigation in Agentic O-RAN
2026-08-28 • Networking and Internet Architecture
Networking and Internet Architecture
AI summaryⓘ
The authors study how to safely manage multiple AI-driven control suggestions (xApps) in open radio networks (O-RAN). They design a system called xTRUCE that prioritizes safety and resolves conflicts between proposals by following strict rules and operator priorities. xTRUCE ensures that the final network actions do not break any physical or operator constraints, even when some AI suggestions are wrong or conflicting. Their tests show the system reliably maintains safe network control and helps guide AI agents to improve their proposals.
O-RANxAppsLarge Language ModelsRadio Access NetworkNear-Real-Time RAN Intelligent ControllerConflict ArbitrationE2 Control LoopOpenAirInterfaceFlexRIC
Authors
Le Xia, Rose Qingyang Hu, Paul S. Kudyba, Zhenlin An, Haijian Sun
Abstract
The open radio access network (O-RAN) is evolving toward agentic operation, where large language model (LLM)-driven xApps/rApps generate control proposals under operator intents. However, such proposals may be conflicting, infeasible, or hallucinated, and no existing system jointly provides proposal-independent safety, priority-aware reconciliation, and traceable feedback. To this end, we propose a provably safe arbiter, namely xTRUCE, in the near-real-time (Near-RT) RAN intelligent controller for mitigating multi-xApp conflicts in gNB control. We first develop a structured xApp proposal interface and a three-layer constraint hierarchy that places physical limits and operator-defined rules above relaxable performance targets, alongside a dual-timescale control action space. A two-stage arbitration mechanism then minimizes target shortfalls in the operator-priority order to finalize safe E2 actions within the Near-RT latency budget, while returning conflict certificates to xApps and the operator for renegotiation. Finally, we implement xTRUCE in a multi-cell O-RAN use case, and evaluate its multi-process prototype through simulations with live API-backed LLM xApps and over-the-air experiments on OpenAirInterface/FlexRIC-based O-RAN stacks. Results show that xTRUCE ensures gNB control safety with $100\%$ protected services despite severe proposal hallucinations, achieves priority-consistent performance satisfaction under overload, efficiently guides LLM intent renegotiation via certificates, and keeps a delay-safe E2 control loop.