Energy-Efficient Multi-Cell Massive MIMO Subject to Minimum User-Rate Constraints

• Published in: IEEE transactions on communications Vol. 69; no. 2; pp. 914 - 928
• Main Authors: Nguyen, Long Dinh, Tuan, Hoang Duong, Duong, Trung Q., Poor, H. Vincent, Hanzo, Lajos
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.02.2021; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Antennas; Array signal processing; beamformer design; Beamforming; energy efficiency; Intercell interference; Massive MIMO; Multi-cell massive MIMO system; nonconvex optimization; Quality of service; Signal transmission; Throughput; Transmitting antennas; user service scheduling
• ISSN: 0090-6778; 1558-0857
• DOI: 10.1109/TCOMM.2020.3030780

The capability of massive multiple-input multiple-output (mMIMO) systems supporting the throughput requirement of as many users as possible is investigated. The bottleneck of serving small numbers of users by a large number of transmit antennas in conventional mMIMO is unblocked by a new time-fraction-wise beamforming technique, which focuses signal transmission in fractions of a time slot. Based on this time-fraction-wise signal transmission, a new user service scheduling scheme for multi-cell mMIMO, whose cell-edge users suffer not only poor channel conditions but also multi-cell interference, is proposed to support a large user-population. We demonstrate that the numbers of users served by our multi-cell mMIMO within a time-slot may be as high as twice the number of its transmit antennas.