Online Convex Optimization for Efficient and Robust Inter-Slice Radio Resource Management

Abstract

Radio access network (RAN) slicing is one of the key technologies in 5G and beyond mobile networks, where multiple logical subnets, i.e., RAN slices, are allowed to run on top of the same physical infrastructure so as to provide slice-specific services. Due to the dynamic environments of wireless networks and the diverse requirements of RAN slices, inter-slice radio resource management (IS-RRM) has become a highly challenging task in RAN slicing. In this paper, we propose a novel online convex optimization (OCO) framework for IS-RRM, which directly learns the instant resource allocation from the data revealed by previous allocations, such that sophisticated modeling and parameterization can be avoided in highly complicated and dynamic wireless environments. Specifically, an online IS-RRM scheme that employs multiple expert-algorithms running in parallel is proposed to keep track of the environmental changes and adjust the resource allocation accordingly. Both theoretical analysis and simulation results show that our proposed scheme can guarantee long-term performance comparable to the optimal strategies given in hindsight.