A potential game approach to distributed power control and scheduling

Abstract

Distributed solutions to resource allocation are motivated by the need to cope with the complexity in modern communication networks. The purpose of this paper is to discuss decentralized resource allocation in a self-organizing network from the viewpoint of potential games. The focus is on power allocation and scheduling in a congested distributed network such as a wireless ad hoc network. Noncooperative resource allocation is studied as a “potential” game, where the potential function is a common proxy objective, formalizing the implicit joint target of the noncooperative players. The potential function can be used to evaluate the system-level efficiency of noncooperative resource allocation. Examples of potential games are discussed in various contexts of distributed resource allocation. A game with discrete or convex strategy sets possessing a potential function has convergent greedy dynamics. A resource price determines the structure of a potential game.