Performance optimization of aircraft in-cabin LTE deployment using Taguchi´s Method

The performance of a multi-cell, multi-user Long Term Evolution (LTE) deployment in a medium-sized aircraft cabin is studied. Due to the structure and construction materials of the aircraft, channel propagation behaviour is different from conventional indoor channel models. Also, depending on the seating plan of the aircraft, user density is higher than other indoor environments. Thus, firstly, a proper channel model is adapted for an aircraft, and then the deployed LTE system is optimized using Taguchi´s Method (TM). TM is a recently used optimization method for electromagnetic (EM) problems and for the optimization of communication networks. The results show that multi-cell, multi-user LTE deployment can achieve 4.33 Mbps average user data rate and 676 Mbps total system data rate with two evolved NodeBs (eNBs) deployed.