QoS-Constrained Resource Allocation Scheduling for LTE Network

Abstract

The goal of LTE (Long Term Evolution) is to provide high data transmission rate, scalable bandwidth, low latency, high-mobility, etc. LTE employs OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) and SC-FDMA (Single Carrier - Frequency Division Multiple Access) for downlink and uplink data transmission, respectively. As to SC-FDMA, there are two constraints in doing resource allocation. First, the allocated resource blocks (RBs) should be contiguous. Second, those of the allocated RBs are forced to use the same modulation technique. The aim of this research is to propose a QoS-constraint resource allocation scheduling to enhance data transmission for uplink SC-FDMA. The proposed scheduling is a three-stage approach. In the first stage, it uses a time domain scheduler to differentiate user equipment (UE) services according to their distinct QoS service requirements. In the second stage, it uses a frequency domain scheduler to prioritize UE services based on channel quality. In the third stage, it limits the number of times of modulation downgrade of RBs allocation in order to enhance system throughput. In the simulations, the proposed method is compared to fixed sub-carrier dynamic resource allocation method and adaptive dynamic sub-carrier resource allocation method. Simulation results show that the proposed method outperforms the other two methods in terms of throughput, transmission delay, packet loss ratio, and RB utilization.