Radio Resource Management in NB-IoT Systems: Empowered by Interference Prediction and Flexible Duplexing

• Published in: IEEE network Vol. 34; no. 1; pp. 144 - 151
• Main Authors: Malik, Hassan, Alam, Muhammad Mahtab, Pervaiz, Haris, Moullec, Yannick Le, Al-Dulaimi, Anwer, Parand, Sven, Reggiani, Luca
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.01.2020; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Delays; Downlink; Interference; Internet of Things; Long Term Evolution; Narrowband; Resource allocation; Resource management; Skewed distributions; Uplink
• DOI: 10.1109/MNET.001.1900087
• ISSN: 0890-8044

NB-IoT is a promising cellular technology for enabling low cost, low power, long-range connectivity to IoT devices. With the bandwidth requirement of 180 kHz, it provides the flexibility to deploy within the existing LTE band. However, this raises serious concerns about the performance of the technology due to severe interference from multi-tier 5G HetNets. Furthermore, as NB-IoT is based on HD-FDD, the symmetric allocation of spectrum band between the downlink and uplink results in underutilization of resources, particularly in the case of asymmetric traffic distribution. Therefore, an innovative RRM strategy needs to be devised to improve spectrum efficiency and device connectivity. This article presents the detailed design challenges that need to be addressed for the RRM of NB-IoT and proposes a novel framework to devise an efficient resource allocation scheme by exploiting cooperative interference prediction and flexible duplexing techniques.