Time-domain ICIC and optimized designs for 5G and beyond: a survey

Abstract

Time-domain enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (eICIC) is an effective technique to reduce the cross-tier inter-cell interference (ICI) in long term evolution (LTE)-based heterogeneous small cell networks (HetSCNs). This paper first clarifies two main communication scenarios in HetSCNs, i.e., macrocells deployed with femtocells (macro-femto) and with picocells (macro-pico). Then, the main challenges in HetSCNs, particularly the severe cross-tier ICI in macro-femto caused by femtocells with closed subscribe group (CSG) access or in macro-pico caused by picocells with range expansion are analyzed. Based on the prominent feature of dominant interference in HetSCNs, the main idea of time-domain interference coordination and two basic schemes in the eICIC standardization, i.e., almost blank subframe (ABS) and orthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbol shift are presented, with a systematic introduction to the interactions of these techniques with other network functions. Then, given macro-femto and macro-pico HetSCNs, an overview is provided on the advanced designs of ABS-based eICIC, including self-optimized designs with regard to key parameters such as ABS muting ratio, and joint optimized designs of ABS-based eICIC and other radio resource management techniques, such as user association and power control. Finally, the open issues and future research directions are discussed.