Impact of Base Station Time Synchronization Mismatch on Almost Blank Subframes

This letter analyzes the impact of imperfect timing synchronization of cellular base stations on feasibility of almost blank subframes, an interference management concept for heterogeneous networks. We claim that the most significant impact of timing synchronization mismatch lays in potential disturbance of a control channel that is located in the beginning of the subframe. We use stochastic geometry to analyze the impact and discover that the timing requirement from time division duplex system suffices also for frequency division duplex system that uses almost blank subframes.