User Clustering and Power Allocation for Hybrid Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access Systems

In this article, a comprehensive strategy of user clustering and power allocation is investigated in downlink hybrid non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks. More particularly, users in the same cluster can receive signals simultaneously by using NOMA techniques, while time-division multiple access (TDMA) schemes are utilized among different clusters. By employing the weight factor, a weighted sum rate maximization problem is formulated and decoupled into user clustering and power allocation problems, where two different schemes for time slot allocation are proposed. The formulated user clustering problems with user-based and cluster-based time slot allocation schemes are respectively considered as coalitional games in characteristic and partition formations, and solved by two different algorithms, where both low-complexity and global optimal methods are proposed. The properties, including complexity, convergence, stability and optimality, are analyzed. To further improve the system performance, the formulated power allocation problem is solved by a successive convex approximation (SCA) based iterative algorithm. Simulation results reveal that: i) the proposed hybrid NOMA system is capable of achieving promising gains over centralized NOMA-based and conventional TDMA-based frameworks; and ii) the developed algorithms can significantly improve the weighted sum rate compared with the random user structure and the fixed power allocation.