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Comparison of Downlink Power Allocation Mechanisms in Soft Handoff for the WCDMA System with Heterogeneous Cell Structures

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Abstract

Handoff in heterogeneous cellular networks is one of the hot topics for wireless networks beyond the third generation. We observe that a power exhausting issue may occur in a code division multiple access (CDMA) system with mixed-sized cells. During soft handoff in the downlink transmission, a number of base stations transmit signals to a user simultaneously. Usually, a microcell has a more stringent limitation on the total available power than a macrocell. Thus, ignoring the impact of various cell sizes, the traditional downlink power allocation techniques for soft handoff may easily consume excessive power to serve soft handoff users, while leaving insufficient power for serving other regular users.

To resolve such an power exhausting issue in CDMA systems, we investigate different downlink power allocation techniques used in soft handoff subject to the impact of mixed-sized cells. For the single-site power allocation technique we consider the site selection diversity transmission (SSDT) technique, while for the multi-site power allocation we study the link proportional power allocation (LPPA), the quality balancing power allocation (QBPA), and the equal power allocation (EPA) techniques. We find that the multi-site LPPA technique can more efficiently allocate power to both handoff and non-handoff users than others. In an example with the ratio of the micrcocell radius/macrocell radius equal to 1/3, it is demonstrated that LPPA can improve the capacity over EPA, QBPA, and SSDT by 125, 30, and 5%, respectively. By taking account of measurement errors in the same case, the capacity improvements of LPPA over EPA, QBPA, and SSDT become 180, 41, and 23%, respectively.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Communication Engineering, National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan

    Ching-Yu Liao, Li-Chun Wang & Chung-Ju Chang

Authors
  1. Ching-Yu Liao
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  2. Li-Chun Wang
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  3. Chung-Ju Chang
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Li-Chun Wang.

Additional information

This work was supported jointly by the Lee and MTI Center for networking research, and the National Science Council, Taiwan under the contracts 90-2213-E-009-068 91-2219-E-009-016, and EX-91-E-FA06-4-4. Part of results in this paper were presented at the IEEE Globecom, Nov. 2002, and the Sixth ACM International Workshop on Modelling, Analysis and Simulation of Wireless and Mobile Systems, (MSWiM’03), Sep. 2003.

Ching-Yu Liao received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Huafan Institute of Technology and National Central University (NCU), Taiwan, in 1995 and 1997, respectively. She is currently working toward the Ph.D degree in communication engineering at National Chiao Tung University (NCTU), Hsinchu, Taiwan. Also, she joins the program of Graduate Student Study Abroad (GSSA), which is sponsored by National Science Council, Taiwan, R.O.C., being a visiting graduate student in Dept. of Electrical Engineering at University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, in 2004. Her research interests include handoff techniques, radio resource management, heterogeneous cellular networks, etc.

Li-Chun Wang received the B.S. degree from National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan, in 1986, the M.S. degree from National Taiwan University in 1988, and the Ms. Sci. and Ph. D. degrees in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, in 1995, and 1996, respectively. From 1990 to 1992, he was with the Telecommunications Laboratories of the Ministry of Transportations and Communications in Taiwan (currently the Telecom Labs of Chunghwa Telecom Co.). In 1995, he was affiliated with Bell Northern Research of Northern Telecom, Inc., Richardson, TX. From 1996 to 2000, he was with AT&T Laboratories, New Jersey, USA, where he was a Senior Technical Staff Member in the Wireless Communications Research Department. Since August 2000, he has been an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Engineering of National Chiao Tung University in Taiwan. His current research interests are in the areas of cellular architectures, radio network resource management, and cross-layer optimization for high speed wireless networks. Dr. Wang was a co-recipient of the Jack Neubauer Memorial Award in 1997 recognizing the best systems paper published in the IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology. He is holding three US patents and one more pending. Currently, he is the associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications.

Chung-Ju Chang was born in Taiwan, R.O.C., in August 1950. He received the B.E. and M.E. degrees in electronics engineering from National Chiao Tung University (NCTU), Hsinchu, Taiwan, in 1972 and 1976, respectively, and the Ph.D degree in electrical engineering from National Taiwan University (NTU), Taiwan, in 1985. From 1976 to 1988, he was with Telecommunication Laboratories, Directorate General of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications, Taiwan, as a Design Engineer, Supervisor, Project Manager, and then Division Director. There, he was involved in designing digital switching system, RAX trunk tester, ISDN user-network interface, and ISDN service and technology trials in Science-Based Industrial Park. In the meantime, he also acted as a Science and Technical Advisor for the Minister of the Ministry of Communications from 1987 to 1989. In 1988, he joined the Faculty of the Department of Communication Engineering and Center for Telecommunications Research, College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, National Chiao Tung University, as an Associate Professor. He has been a Professor since 1993. He was Director of the Institute of Communication Engineering from August 1993 to July 1995 and Chairman of Department of Communication Engineering from August 1999 to July 2001. Now, he is the Dean of the Research and Development Office in NCTU. He was an Advisor for the Ministry of Education to promote the education of communication science and technologies for colleges and universities in Taiwan since 1995. He is also acting as a Committee Member of the Telecommunication Deliberate Body. His research interests include performance evaluation, wireless communication networks, and broadband networks. Dr. Chang is a member of the Chinese Institute of Engineers (CIE).

E-mail:cjchang@cc.nctu.edu.tw

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Liao, CY., Wang, LC. & Chang, CJ. Comparison of Downlink Power Allocation Mechanisms in Soft Handoff for the WCDMA System with Heterogeneous Cell Structures. Wireless Netw 11, 593–605 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11276-005-3515-8

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