In this paper, we investigate the problem of optimal base station (BS) ON-OFF switching and user association in a heterogeneous network (HetNet) with massive MIMO, with the objective to maximize the system energy efficiency (EE). The joint BS ON-OFF switching and user association problem is formulated as an integer programming problem. We first develop a centralized scheme, in which we relax the integer constraints and employ a series of Lagrangian dual methods that transform the original problem into a standard linear programming (LP) problem. Due to the special structure of the LP, we prove that the optimal solution to the relaxed LP is also feasible and optimal to the original problem. We then propose a distributed scheme by formulating a repeated bidding game for users and BS's, and prove that the game converges to a Nash Equilibrium (NE). Simulation studies demonstrate that the proposed schemes can achieve considerable gains in EE over several benchmark schemes in all the scenarios considered.
@cite_7: In this paper, we propose a novel scheme to improve the throughput of femtocell networks. The proposed scheme consists of two steps: spectrum allocation for femtocells and dealing with nearby macro-users with access control strategy. Since the positions of femtocells are relatively stable, we firstly deal with inter-femtocell interference and formulate it as an integer programming problem. Then we analyze the effects of different access strategies on system throughput for each sub-channel and propose a novel access control strategy. Finally, the superiority of the proposed scheme is verified by simulation results.
@cite_17: Due to the high potential to enhance spectral efficiency and spatial reuse, small cell networks, SCNs, have emerged as a promising solution to improve the capacity of mobile communication systems so as to satisfy the ever growing demand for high data rate services. However, without proper planning, the dense deployment of SCNs may cause severe interference, resulting in limited capacity. In hotspots with a large number of users, the small cell network is challenged by the extremely high aggregated capacity requirement and may fail to guarantee the quality of service of all users. To leverage the benefits of SCNs and overcome the drawbacks, we propose a cooperative small cell network, CSCN, architecture that jointly utilizes several advanced techniques to enhance the capacity of hotspots. In this article, we first examine the existing solutions for capacity enhancement and hotspots. We then present the basic concept of the proposed CSCN architecture, and discuss the related technical aspects. The high potential of a CSCN in terms of capacity improvement and interference mitigation is demonstrated by a simulation study. Finally, we present several open problems for future research based on the CSCN architecture.
@cite_6: The fifth generation mobile networks will be developed to improve area spectral and energy efficiency, and provide uniform user experience. Hyper-dense small cell deployment can move devices closer to the wireless network and satisfy 5G system requirements. The main challenge of this network deployment results from the random deployment, dynamic on-off, flexible connection to cellular core networks, and flat system architecture of 5G systems. Therefore, conventional network planning and radio resource management, which depend on a central control node, cannot be applied to small cell networks. In this article some cooperative distributed radio resource management algorithms for time synchronization, carrier selection, and power control are discussed for hyper-dense small cell deployment.
@cite_19: For small cell technology to significantly increase the capacity of tower-based cellular networks, mobile users will need to be actively pushed onto the more lightly loaded tiers (corresponding to, e.g., pico and femtocells), even if they offer a lower instantaneous SINR than the macrocell base station (BS). Optimizing a function of the long-term rate for each user requires (in general) a massive utility maximization problem over all the SINRs and BS loads. On the other hand, an actual implementation will likely resort to a simple biasing approach where a BS in tier j is treated as having its SINR multiplied by a factor Aj ≥ 1, which makes it appear more attractive than the heavily-loaded macrocell. This paper bridges the gap between these approaches through several physical relaxations of the network-wide association problem, whose solution is NP hard. We provide a low-complexity distributed algorithm that converges to a near-optimal solution with a theoretical performance guarantee, and we observe that simple per-tier biasing loses surprisingly little, if the bias values Aj are chosen carefully. Numerical results show a large (3.5x) throughput gain for cell-edge users and a 2x rate gain for median users relative to a maximizing received power association.
@cite_15: Femtocells are recognized as effective for improving network coverage and capacity and for reducing power consumption due to the reduced range of wireless transmissions. Although highly appealing, a plethora of challenging problems need to be addressed for fully harvesting its potential. In this paper, we investigate the problem of cell association and service scheduling in femtocell networks. In addition to the general goal of offloading traffic from the macrobase station (BS), we also aim at minimizing the latency of service requested by the users, while considering both open and closed access strategies. We show that the cell association problem is NP-hard, and propose several near-optimal solution algorithms for assigning users to BSs, including a sequential fixing algorithm, a rounding approximation algorithm, a greedy approximation algorithm, and a randomized algorithm. For service scheduling, we develop an optimal algorithm to minimize the average waiting time for the users associated with the same BS. The proposed algorithms are analyzed with respect to performance bounds, approximation ratios, and optimality, and are evaluated with simulations.
@cite_11: The wireless industry has been experiencing an explosion of data traffic usage in recent years and is now facing an even bigger challenge, an astounding 1000-fold data traffic increase in a decade. The required traffic increase is in bits per second per square kilometer, which is equivalent to bits per second per Hertz per cell × Hertz × cell per square kilometer. The innovations through higher utilization of the spectrum (bits per second per Hertz per cell) and utilization of more bandwidth (Hertz) are quite limited: spectral efficiency of a point-to-point link is very close to the theoretical limits, and utilization of more bandwidth is a very costly solution in general. Hyper-dense deployment of heterogeneous and small cell networks (HetSNets) that increase cells per square kilometer by deploying more cells in a given area is a very promising technique as it would provide a huge capacity gain by bringing small base stations closer to mobile devices. This article presents a holistic view on hyperdense HetSNets, which include fundamental preference in future wireless systems, and technical challenges and recent technological breakthroughs made in such networks. Advancements in modeling and analysis tools for hyper-dense HetSNets are also introduced with some additional interference mitigation and higher spectrum utilization techniques. This article ends with a promising view on the hyper-dense HetSNets to meet the upcoming 1000× data challenge.
User association in HetNet has been widely investigated, such as @cite_19 @cite_15 @cite_7 . @cite_19 , user association and resource allocation were jointly considered to maximize the sum utility of users. Using dual decomposition, the proposed scheme can be implemented with a distributed algorithm, and the solution is shown to be near-optimal. @cite_15 , user association was considered to minimize the maximum load among all BS's, several approximation algorithms were proposed with analysis on complexity and performance bound. @cite_7 , user association is determined by the achievable rate of each user. The HetNet with dense small cell deployment has drawn increasing interests since new challenges arise when a large number of SBS's are deployed in a given area. An overview of hyper-dense HetNet was presented in @cite_11 , several cooperative approaches were proposed in @cite_6 and @cite_17 to enhance the network performance.