Optimized energy efficient content distribution over wireless networks with mobile-to-mobile cooperation

Mobile terminals interested in the same content and that are in the vicinity of each other can cooperate to improve the efficiency of the download process. In this paper, content distribution and cooperation among the mobile terminals is coordinated by the base station which is the centralized entity that runs an optimization framework to minimize energy consumption at mobile terminals while guaranteeing quality of service constraints. Two cooperation cases are investigated where the mobile terminals can either unicast or multicast the content they receive from the base station to each other. Results show that as the number of cooperating mobile terminals increases the total energy consumption decreases compared to the non-cooperative case.