Relay Transmit Power Control In Cellular Multi-Hop Networks

In cellular multi-hop networks relay stations (RSs) are used to forward transmissions between the base station (BS) and user equipment (UE). The power at which the RS transmits not only determines which UEs it can serve but also the spatial separation at which another RS can reuse the same channel. It therefore jointly controls the routing and the medium access control (MAC) decisions. This means the optimal selection of the RS transmission power, which will be different for each target UE, is critical in realising the full benefits of a multi-hop system. In this paper we propose and evaluate a RS transmission power control (TPC) scheme that jointly considers the routing and MAC issues. We compare the capacities obtained from it to those obtained for a fixed RS transmit power case so as to infer relative benefits.