Inter-cell interference management using maximum rank planning in 5G small cell networks

In this paper, we propose Maximum Rank Planning (MRP) as a novel inter-cell interference management technique for the ultra-dense uncoordinated deployment of small cells targeted by 5^th Generation (5G) networks. Rather than operating in the frequency domain as the conventional Frequency Reuse Planning (FRP) technique, MRP acts by reducing the number of Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) spatial multiplexing streams. This reduction leads to an increased probability that the Interference Rejection Combining (IRC) receiver will have sufficient degrees-of-freedom to reject the strongest interferers. System-level simulation results show that MRP outperforms FRP in both low and high traffic load conditions, with 44% and 49% outage throughput gains in each case, respectively.