Practical framework for ultra-fair dynamic interference coordination in mobile communication systems

Inter-cell interference coordination (ICIC) has been widely studied in recent years, in which dynamic schemes form one of the most promising categories thanks to their flexibility and high performance. By carefully coordinating user equipments (UEs) in adjacent cells using Hungarian algorithm or heuristic algorithms, inter-cell interference can be decreased and traditional max–min fairness can be achieved. However, some interferers are so strong that even UEs close to their evolved nodeBs can be damaged to low performance, referred to as ‘excessive coordination’ in this study. Therefore, the authors propose a framework for ultra-fair dynamic ICIC, which balances the serious impacts of strong interferers so that higher max–min fairness than the traditional one can be achieved. By dividing the coordination procedure into periods, the authors’ framework maintains a utility matrix obtained by combining the instantaneous channel state information of the current period and previously achieved cumulative spectral efficiencies. Heuristic algorithms are used on this utility matrix periodically to achieve higher max–min fairness. In this way, a fairer coordination than traditional max–min fairness is achieved after iterating for several periods. Extensive simulations demonstrate that their framework largely improves max–min fairness without obviously degrading the system spectral efficiency.