Long-term window scheduling for eICIC with user mobility in LTE HetNets

Enhanced Inter Cell Interference Coordination (eICIC) is a time-domain technique to achieve load balancing among macro and pico cells in heterogeneous networks (HetNets). eICIC uses two network parameters to address the interference problem: i) Cell Range Extension (CRE) to increase the coverage of pico cells; ii) Almost Blank Subframe (ABS) to reduce the interference for users in pico cells when macro cells keep mute. The majority of previous work only considered network parameter optimization for users with fixed locations. In this paper, we jointly optimize CRE bias and ABS ratio for users with mobility based on near-future channel conditions within a long-term near-future time window. With this purpose we introduce a signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) map, which is a geographical map with overlay average SINR values upon map pixels. Combined with mobility prediction, the near-future channel conditions within the scheduling window can be predicted. Simulation results illustrate the performance gain brought by the proposed algorithm.