By incorporating cloud computing capabilities to provide radio access functionalities, Cloud Radio Access Networks (CRANs) are considered to be a key enabling technology of future 5G and beyond communication systems. In CRANs, centralized radio resource allocation optimization is performed over a large number of small cells served by simple access points, the Remote Radio Heads (RRHs). However, the fronthaul links connecting each RRH to the cloud introduce delays and entail imperfect Channel State Information (CSI) knowledge at the cloud processors. In order to satisfy the stringent latency requirements envisioned for 5G applications, the concept of Fog Radio Access Networks (FogRANs) has recently emerged for providing cloud computing at the edge of the network. Although FogRAN may alleviate the latency and CSI quality issues of CRAN, its distributed nature degrades network interference mitigation and global system performance. Therefore, we investigate the design of tailored user pre-scheduling and beamforming for FogRANs. In particular, we propose a hybrid algorithm that exploits both the centralized feature of the cloud for globally-optimized pre-scheduling using imperfect global CSIs, and the distributed nature of FogRAN for accurate beamforming with high quality local CSIs. The centralized phase enables the interference patterns over the global network to be considered, while the distributed phase allows for latency reduction, in line with the requirements of FogRAN applications. Simulation results show that our proposed algorithm outperforms the baseline algorithm under imperfect CSIs, jointly in terms of throughput, energy efficiency, as well as delay.

In the context of resource isolation for network slicing, this paper introduces two resource allocation methods especially for the radio access network (RAN) part. Both methods can be implemented by slight modification of the ordinary packet scheduling algorithm such as the proportional fairness algorithm, and guarantee resource isolation by limiting the maximum number of resource blocks (RBs) allocated to each slice. Moreover, since both methods flexibly allocate RBs to the entire system bandwidth, there are cases in which the throughput performance is improved compared to when the system bandwidth is divided in a static manner, especially in a frequency selective channel environment. Numerical results show the superiority of these methods to dividing simply the system bandwidth in a static manner, and show the difference between the features of the methods in terms of the throughput performance of each slice.

In this paper, we clarify the issues in a metropolitan environment involving overlying frequency bands with various bandwidths and propose a cell selection scheme that improves the communications quality based on user and network characteristics. Different frequency bands with various signal bandwidths will be overlaid on each other in forthcoming fifth-generation (5G) radio access networks. At the same time, services, applications or features of sets of user equipment (UEs) will become more diversified and the requirements for the quality of communications will become more varied. Moreover, in real environments, roads and buildings have irregular constructions. Especially in an urban or metropolitan environment, the complex architecture present in a metropolis directly affects radio propagation. Under these conditions, the communications quality is degraded because cell radio resources are depleted due to many UE connections and the mismatch between service requirements and cell capabilities. The proposed scheme prevents this degradation in communications quality. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is evaluated in an ideal regular deployment and in a non-regular metropolitan environment based on computer simulations. Simulation results show that the average of the time for the proposed scheme from the start of transmission to the completion of reception at the UE is improved by approximately 40% compared to an existing cell selection scheme that is based on the Maximum Signal-to-Interference plus Noise power Ratio (SINR).

Wi-Fi Direct is a promising and available technology for device-to-device (D2D) proximity communications. To improve the performances of Wi-Fi Direct communication, optimized radio resource allocations are important. This paper proposes network assisted Wi-Fi Direct (NAWD), which operates based on the media independent services framework of IEEE 802.21 standard, for optimizing radio resource allocations. The NAWD is enhanced Wi-Fi Direct with the assistance of infrastructure networks (e.g., cellular network) and allocates radio resources (e.g., frequency channels and transmit power) to reduce radio interferences among Wi-Fi Direct devices (e.g., smart phones and set-top boxes). The NAWD includes mechanisms for gathering configuration information (e.g., location information and network connection information) of Wi-Fi Direct devices and allocating optimized radio resources (e.g., frequency channels and transmit power) to reduce radio interferences among Wi-Fi Direct devices. Simulation results show that the proposed NAWD increases significantly SINR, power efficiency, and areal capacity compared to legacy Wi-Fi Direct, where areal capacity is total traffic throughput per unit area.

Potential games form a class of non-cooperative games where the convergent of unilateral improvement dynamics is guaranteed in many practical cases. The potential game approach has been applied to a wide range of wireless network problems, particularly to a variety of channel assignment problems. In this paper, the properties of potential games are introduced, and games in wireless networks that have been proven to be potential games are comprehensively discussed.

Network selection is one of the hot issues in the fusion of heterogeneous wireless networks (HWNs). However, most of previous works only consider selecting single-access network, which wastes other available network resources, rarely take account of multi-access. To make full utilization of available coexisted networks, this paper proposes a novel multi-access selection algorithm based on joint utility optimization for users with multi-mode terminals. At first, the algorithm adopts exponential smoothing method (ESM) to get smoothed values of received signal strength (RSS). Then we obtain network joint utility function under the constraints of bandwidth and number of networks, with the consideration of trade-off between network benefit and cost. At last, Lagrange multiplier and dual optimization methods are used to maximize joint utility. Users select multiple networks according to the optimal association matrix of user and network. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can optimize network joint utility, improve throughput, effectively reduce vertical handoff number, and ensure Quality of Service (QoS).

We seek a resource allocation algorithm through carrier allocation and modulation mode selection for improving the quality of service (QoS) that can adapt to various screen sizes and dynamic channel variations. In terms of visual quality, the expected visual entropy (EVE) is defined to quantify the visual information of being contained in each layer of the scalable video coding (SVC). Fairness optimization is conducted to maximize the EVE using an objective function for given constraints of radio resources. To conduct the fairness optimization, we propose a novel approximation algorithm for resource allocation for the maximal EVE. Simulations confirm that the QoS in terms of the EVE or peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) is significantly improved by using the novel algorithm.

To enhance the throughput while satisfying the quality of service (QoS) requirements of wireless local area networks (WLANs), this paper proposes a distributed coordination function-based (DCF-based) medium access control (MAC) protocol that realizes centralized radio resource management (RRM) for a basic service set. In the proposed protocol, an access point (AP) acts as a master to organize the associated stations and attempts to reserve the radio resource in a conventional DCF-manner. Once the radio resource is successfully reserved, the AP controls the access of each station by an orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) scheme. Because the AP assigns radio resources to the stations through the opportunistic two-dimensional scheduling based on the QoS requirements and the channel condition of each station, the transmission opportunities can be granted to the appropriate stations. In order to reduce the signaling overhead caused by centralized RRM, the proposed protocol introduces a station-grouping scheme which groups the associated stations into clusters. Moreover, this paper proposes a heuristic resource allocation algorithm designed for the DCF-based MAC protocol. Numerical results confirm that the proposed protocol enhances the throughput of WLANs while satisfying the QoS requirements with high probability.

Wireless personal area networks (WPANs) will play an important role in next-generation communication networks. Currently, two technologies are being considered for the physical layer of WPANs, based on the two ultra wideband (UWB) standards, namely, multiband orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (MB-OFDM) UWB and direct-sequence (DS) UWB. The coexistence issue of these two types of WPANs in the same coverage area, raises new issues and introduces new problems which should be dealt with to avoid performance degradation. In particular, efficient radio resource management (RRM) in such environments is challenging. Indeed, the coexistence of heterogenous UWB based WPANs (UPANs) has an ad hoc nature, which requires RRM approaches that are different from traditional infrastructure-based ones. In this paper, we propose new algorithms for two RRM modules in heterogeneous UPANs, namely, radio access technology (RAT) selection and vertical handoff (VHO). To improve the overall performance of the system, our design considers possible narrowband interference (NBI) in the environment as well as the link outage probability, in the decision process. We also provide an analytical model based on a 4D Markov process to study the system in equilibrium and derive the performance metrics, namely, the new-call and handoff-call blocking probabilities, throughput and average carried traffic. Numerical results and comparisons show that our design achieves enhanced performance in terms of throughput and grade of service (GoS).

We propose a new cognitive radio network architecture using the IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) functionality. We implement the cognitive radio network entities standardized in IEEE 1900.4 on the IMS that exchanges RAN and terminal context information between the networks and the terminals to make optimum and immediate reconfiguration decisions. In our proposed architecture, RAN context information is obtained from cellular networks which are directly connected to the IMS. The presence management functions of the IMS are applied to exchange those information in a “push” manner, which enables immediate notification of changes in wireless environment. We evaluate the performance of the proposed context information exchange method, by comparing with the cases that adequate and immediate RAN context information is not available. The evaluation results show that the proposed framework gives 10–30% superior performance than the conventional cognitive radio networks.

This paper proposes a utility function-based scheduling algorithm for integrated real-time and non-real-time services in long-term evolution systems. The proposed utility function satisfies the target dropping ratio of real-time users; it uses the delay constraint and increases the throughput of non-real-time users by scheduling real-time users together with non-real-time users. Simulation results show that the proposed scheduling algorithm significantly improves the throughput of non-real-time users without sacrificing the quality of service of real-time users.

We consider Downlink (DL) scheduling for a multi-user cooperative cellular system with fixed relays. The conventional scheduling trend is to avoid interference by allocating orthogonal radio resources to each user, although simultaneous allocation of users on the same resource has been proven to be superior in, e.g., the broadcast channel. Therefore, we design a scheduler where in each frame, two selected relayed users are supported simultaneously through the Superposition Coding (SC) based scheme proposed in this paper. In this scheme, the messages destined to the two users are superposed in the modulation domain into three SC layers, allowing them to benefit from their high quality relayed links, thereby increasing the sum-rate. We derive the optimal power allocation over these three layers that maximizes the sum-rate under an equal rates' constraint. By integrating this scheme into the proposed scheduler, the simulation results show that our proposed SC scheduler provides high throughput and rate outage probability performance, indicating a significant fairness improvement. This validates the approach of simultaneous allocation versus orthogonal allocation in the cooperative cellular system.

This paper proposes new scheduling algorithms for best effort (BE) traffic classification in business femtocell networks. The purpose of traffic classification is to provide differentiated services to BE users depending on their traffic classes, and the concept of traffic classification is called Inter User Best Effort (IUBE) in CDMA2000 1x Evolution Data Optimized (EVDO) standard. Traffic differentiation is achieved by introducing Grade of Service (GoS) as a quality of service (QoS) parameter into the scheduler's decision metric (DM). New scheduling algorithms are called QoS Round Robin (QoS-RR), QoS Proportionally Fair (QoS-PF), QoS maximum data rate control (DRC) (QoS-maxDRC), QoS average DRC (QoS-aveDRC), QoS exponent DRC (QoS-expDRC), QoS maxDRC-PF (QoS-maxDRC-PF). Two different femtocell throughput experiments are performed using real femtocell devices in order to collect real DRC values. The first experiment examines 4, 8, 12 and 16 IUBE users, while second experiment examines 4 IUBE + 2 Voice over IP (VoIP), 8 IUBE + 2 VoIP, 12 IUBE + 2 VoIP, 16 IUBE + 2 (VoIP) users. Average sector throughput, IUBE traffic differentiation, VoIP delay bound error values are investigated to compare the performance of the proposed scheduling algorithms. In conclusion, QoS-maxDRC-PF scheduler is proposed for business femtocell environment.

Base station coordination is considered as a promising technique to mitigate inter-cell interference and improve the cell-edge performance in cellular orthogonal frequency division multiple-access (OFDMA) networks. The problem to design an efficient radio resource allocation scheme for coordinated cellular OFDMA networks incorporating base station coordination has been only partially investigated. In this contribution, a novel radio resource allocation algorithm with universal frequency reuse is proposed to support base station coordinated transmission. Firstly, with the assumption of global coordination between all base station sectors in the network, a coordinated subchannel assignment algorithm is proposed. Then, by dividing the entire network into a number of disjoint coordinated clusters of base station sectors, a reduced-feedback algorithm for subchannel assignment is proposed for practical use. The utility function based on the user average throughput is used to balance the efficiency and fairness of wireless resource allocation. System level simulation results demonstrate that the reduced-feedback subchannel assignment algorithm significantly improves the cell-edge average throughput and the fairness index of users in the network, with acceptable degradation of cell-average performance.

This paper proposes a concept for a new technical field called wireless distributed network (WDN) as a strategic technical field to enable flexible networking and radio resource management (RRM) to cope with dynamic variation of spatially distributed traffic demands. As the core technical subject areas for the WDN, this paper identifies distributed networking for flexible network creation, cooperative transmission and reception for flexible link creation, and dynamic spectrum access for flexible radio resource management, and explains their technical features and challenges for constructing the WDN. This paper also discusses some already being studied application fields as well as potential future directions of the WDN applications.

In this letter, we propose a distributed channel assignment where each basestation selects a set of channels shared by multiple users through time domain scheduling for best effort services. The proposed scheme distributedly assigns the channels considering a cochannel interference from neighboring basestations and its own traffic load condition. The computer simulation demonstrates that the proposed scheme appropriately assigns the channels to the basestations taking into account these requirements.

This paper reviews applications of fuzzy logic to telecommunications and proposes a novel fuzzy combining scheme for cooperative spectrum sensing in cognitive radio systems. A summary of previous applications of fuzzy logic to telecommunications is given outlining also potential applications of fuzzy logic in future cognitive radio systems. In complex and dynamic operational environments, future cognitive radio systems will need sophisticated decision making and environment awareness techniques that are capable of handling multidimensional, conflicting and usually non-predictable decision making problems where optimal solutions can not be necessarily found. The results indicate that fuzzy logic can be used in cooperative spectrum sensing to provide additional flexibility to existing combining methods.

In this paper, we formulate a plan to operate multi-hop relays in IEEE 802.22-based cognitive radio (CR) systems and evaluate system performance to consider the propriety of a multi-hop relay scheme in CR systems. A centralized radio resource management and a simple deployment of relay stations (RSs) are assessed to make relay operations feasible under CR conditions. Simulation results show that the proposed multi-hop relay scheme significantly increases system throughput compared to a no-relay CR system as the incumbent user (IU) traffic gets heavier. Furthermore, the optimal number of hops can be determined given the traffic conditions.

When the number of users in a service area increases in mobile multimedia services, no individual user can obtain satisfactory radio resources such as bandwidth and signal power because the resources are limited and shared. A solution for such a problem is user-position control. In the user-position control, the operator informs users of better communication areas (or spots) and navigates them to these positions. However, because of subjective costs caused by subjects moving from their original to a new position, they do not always attempt to move. To motivate users to contribute their resources in network services that require resource contributions for users, incentive-rewarding mechanisms have been proposed. However, there are no mechanisms that distribute rewards appropriately according to various subjective factors involving users. Furthermore, since the conventional mechanisms limit how rewards are paid, they are applicable only for the network service they targeted. In this paper, we propose a novel incentive-rewarding mechanism to solve these problems, using an external evaluator and interactive learning agents. We also investigated ways of appropriately controlling rewards based on user contributions and system service quality. We applied the proposed mechanism and reward control to the user-position control, and demonstrated its validity.

Wireless technology has become widely popular and an important means of communication. A key issue in delivering wireless services is the problem of congestion which has an adverse impact on the Quality of Service (QoS), especially timeliness. Although a lot of work has been done in the context of RRM (Radio Resource Management), the deliverance of quality service to the end user still remains a challenge. Therefore there is need for a system that provides real-time services to the users through high assurance. We propose an intelligent agent-based approach to guarantee a predefined Service Level Agreement (SLA) with heterogeneous user requirements for appropriate bandwidth allocation in QoS sensitive cellular networks. The proposed system architecture exploits Case Based Reasoning (CBR) technique to handle RRM process of congestion management. The system accomplishes predefined SLA through the use of Retrieval and Adaptation Algorithm based on CBR case library. The proposed intelligent agent architecture gives autonomy to Radio Network Controller (RNC) or Base Station (BS) in accepting, rejecting or buffering a connection request to manage system bandwidth. Instead of simply blocking the connection request as congestion hits the system, different buffering durations are allocated to diverse classes of users based on their SLA. This increases the opportunity of connection establishment and reduces the call blocking rate extensively in changing environment. We carry out simulation of the proposed system that verifies efficient performance for congestion handling. The results also show built-in dynamism of our system to cater for variety of SLA requirements.