Fractional frequency reuse for interference management in LTE-advanced hetnets

Improvement of cell coverage and network capacity are two major challenges for the evolving 4G cellular wireless communication networks such as LTE-Advanced networks. In this context, hierarchical layering of cells with macro base stations coexisting with low-power and shortrange base stations (corresponding to picocells or femtocells) in a service area is considered to be an efficient solution to enhance the spectral efficiency of the network per unit area. Also, such a hierarchical cell deployment, which is referred to as a heterogeneous network, or Het- Net, provides significant improvement in the coverage of indoor and cell edge users and ensures better QoS to the users. Interference mitigation between different layers is one of the key issues that needs to be resolved for successful deployment of HetNets. To this end, fast frequency response, FFR, is considered to be an efficient intercell interference coordination technique for OFDMA-based HetNets. This article focuses on evaluating three state-of-the-art FFR deployment schemes: strict FFR, soft FFR, and FFR-3 schemes for OFDMA-based two-tier HetNets comprising macrocells overlaid with femtocells. Also, a variation of the FFR-3 scheme, which is referred to as the optimal static FFR (OSFFR) scheme, is proposed. A broad comparison among all these FFR schemes is performed by using Monte Carlo simulations considering performance metrics such as outage probability, average network sum rate, and spectral efficiency. Simulation results show that, the average gains in spectral efficiency (b/s/Hz) of the network are significantly higher for the proposed scheme when compared to the strict FFR, soft FFR, and FFR-3 schemes.