Downlink resource allocation in LTE: centralized vs. distributed approach

Abstract

The 3GPP specifications for LTE leave many degrees of freedom to operators about how to design radio Resource Allocation (RA) strategies, and this is actually also allowed by the OFDM/OFDMA access technology. This means that RA can be faced from many points of view, motivating the research in several directions. In fact, it is clear that both centralized and distributed schemes appear as two valid alternatives to effectively manage radio resources from a multi-cell perspective in order to cope with the requirements imposed by applications and users by keeping inter-cell interference under control. The objective of this paper is to compare via simulation these two approaches under the same network conditions, in terms of users distribution, channel realizations, traffic models, taking into account a complex realistic scenario. Performance will be evaluated in terms of user throughput and power consumption, and some conclusions on advantages and drawbacks of each approach will be drawn.