Radio Resource Management for Efficient Deployment of Advanced Technologies with Evolution of LTE

Abstract

Cellular networks have been rapidly evolving to improve the system's spectral efficiency and provide high data rates. 3GPP-based cellular networks have evolved with the release of new additional specifications from LTE in Release 8 to LTE-Advanced in Release 10 and most recently to LTE-Advanced Pro in Release 13. These markers are indications of major enhancements in LTE cellular networks. In order to enable this evolution, it is required to not only improve existing technologies, but introduce novel technologies. However, introducing new technologies from theory to practical systems is non-trivial due to real-world constraints. Combining a number of techniques makes it possible to abridge the gap between theoretically proven research and marketable technology. In this doctoral thesis, the key aspects of radio resource management techniques are studied, investigated and more advanced techniques are proposed to enable efficient integration of new technologies into 3GPP LTE cellular networks. Specifically, the thesis addresses the four primary aspects related radio resource management. Firstly, interference coordination via dynamic scheduling in multi-user MIMO system are studied, with the key motivation to improve the practical gains of MU-MIMO in a constrained environment. Secondly, synchronization procedures in device-to-device communication for faster timing and frequency synchronization between the devices is investigated. Thirdly, resource allocation for signaling overhead to enable massive carrier aggregation is studied. Lastly, medium access (MAC) layer scheduling framework issues are addressed for a multi-user multi-flow traffic scenario in modern wireless networks. The new proposed methods and techniques are compared in terms of respective performance metrics for each of the aforementioned technologies. The 3GPP LTE framework is utilized to conduct both system and link level simulations to examine the performance of proposed techniques in a practical constrained environment. Most of the simulation assumptions are based on 3GPP agreements such that the techniques and their results are valid according to research and industrial standards.