1

Hamza Gondal (08-0328)

Telecommunication Engineering
National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences
i080328@nu.edu.pk







Abstract The goal of interference coordination is to
minimize the interference experienced between cells for
both uplink and downlink. Upon detection of high
interference at base station or user terminals, a set of
parameters (e.g. transmit power, antenna parameters) can
be adjusted. Today it is again time consuming
and requires substantial manual effort. The RET based
interference coordination can adjust the antenna tilt in a
timely manner to mitigate inter-cell interference
while maintaining the required coverage of cells as shown
in the figure below.




I ndex Terms Inter-cell interference, coordination, OFDMA
techniques

I. INTRODUCTION

Impact of interference coordination is on intra-cell
scheduling and this impact is studied through extensive




Awais Aslam (08-0494)
Telecommunication Engineering
National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences
i080494@nu.edu.pk





simulations. The results of these simulations provide
information that whether the pure fractional frequency reuse
can provide similar improvement in the cell edge throughput
or not. This pure fractional frequency also tells whether it can
provide fairer distribution of throughput in both central as
well as cell-edge areas. The comparison is usually done with
the power coordinated counterpart at less cost in terms of
overall throughput. Another loss or disadvantage of the pure
fractional frequency is that it does not allow the management
os asymmetrical changes in the distribution of users across
different cells in the entire system. Therefore even though
flexible frequency reuse schemes are available, we prefer
power coordinated system.



II. OFDM A POSSIBLE SOLUTION?

In recent years, OFDM and its different variants seem to
prove dominant for future wireless technologies. This result
may be concluded on the robustness of such multi carrier
communication techniques that were developed against the
frequency selecting. There are many reasons for which
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) has
been a promising solution in providing opportunities in
scheduling.







Interference Coordination in Wireless Networks
T



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The Multiplexing provided in OFDM is based on the fact
that distinct sub-channels in frequency domain are allocated
to different users per time slot. This two dimensional
scheduling in time-frequency domain provides faster
resolution of resource allocation. However since cellular
systems are interference limited, this factor can affect the
schedulers efficiency in OFDMA when we talk about the
inter-cell scale. This shows that to control the inter-cell
interference, interference management techniques are crucial.
Each of these techniques or policies affect the throughput,
fairness as well as the coverage in terms of the efficiency of
intra-cell scheduling algorithm.
Generally, such interference management schemes can be
categorized into three major approaches i.e. interference
randomization, interference cancellation and interference
coordination. There are various methods available that are
suitable to exploit frequency diversity. Such methods may
include randomization schemes that comprise frequency
hopping and cell-specific scrambling. However, our main aim
is to devise techniques that can fit into the OFDMA based
scheduling preferably in full load scenarios.







III. LTE ANOTHER WAY TO MINIMIZE INTERFERENCE?


Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing Access
(OFDMA) is used by the LTE, Long-Term Evolution system)
in the downlink (DL) and Single Carrier Frequency Division
Multiplexing Access (SC-FDMA) in the uplink (UL). By
using these two multiple access techniques, it is ensured that
that network will have greater flexibility and a higher radio
spectrum usage ratio. The basic operation in these techniques
is that the frequency spectrum is divided into different blocks
that are called Physical Resource Block (PRB). In the
downlink, a PRB is defined as 12 consecutive OFDM
subcarriers in the frequency domain corresponding to 180
kHz and a consecutive number of symbols in the time domain
corresponding to one defined time slot. Furthermore,
according to the cycle prefix type, two different
configurations are also defined. One being the case of normal
cyclic prefix, other being number of symbols per slot is 6 or 7
otherwise.
The resource assignment granularity is what PRB
corresponds to in LTE. An appropriate number of PRBs are
selected by the scheduler that is located in the base station
(eNB, evolved Node B) whose purpose is to serve users for a
predetermined amount of time. An inter-cell Interference then
occurs when sufficiently close eNBs allocate the same PRB
causing a Signal to Interference plus Noise Ratio (SINR)
degradation. A severe interference between two PRBs occur
in the edge zone of a cell which results in a bad channel
transmission quality.
The ICIC (Inter-cell Interference Coordination) feature was
proposed by the the Release 8 of the 3GGP standardization
body in order to reduce the Inter-cell interference in the LTE.
It is one of the new RRM (Radio Resource management)
functions. In order to keep the inter-cell interference under
control, the ICIC is located in the eNB and is assigned the
task of managing the PRBs. The coordination between
neighboring NBs is based on the exchange of interference
information. The Load Indication procedure is used for this
coordination that takes place on the LTE X2 Interface
between eNBs. Such procedure comes under the category of
X2 control plane interface procedures. It is initiated by an
eNB when sending a Load Information Message to
neighboring eNBs.



IV. POWER CONTROL AND INTER-CELL INTERFERENCE
COORDINATION

The standardization for Power Control of LTE is done
within [TS36.213].Performance Level indicators can be used
for the purpose of controlling the power level in the
downlink. Such indicator may consist of Relative Narrowband
Transmit Power (RNTP) per PRB which is signaled through
the X2 interface to the neighboring eNBs. Whereas for the
purpose of uplink, combined open-loop and closed-loop
power control is used by the terminals. Furthermore, to
mitigate the inter-cell interference in the Uplink a
standardized Inter-Cell Interference Coordination mechanism
can be used through which the power settings can be modified
based on the interference indicators that are exchanged over
the X2 interface. These indicators can be uniquely identified
The Load Information Message has three major Information
Elements (IE):

UL Interference Overload Indication IE (OI): optional
IE, it indicates the interference level (ex: high, medium,
low), per PRB, experienced by the message-emitting
eNB. This proactive message indicates to the other eNBs
the eventuality of using this PRB.



3
UL High Interference Indication IE (HII): mandatory IE,
it indicates the interference sensitivity per PRB as seen
from the message-emitting eNB. The value 0 indicates
low interference sensitivity and the value 1 indicates
a high interference sensitivity. This reactive message is
intended to possibly stop the use of the PRB by other
eNBs.
Relative Narrowband Tx Power (RNTP): optional IE,

It indicates, per PRB, whether the downlink trans-
mission power is lower than the value indicated by a
given threshold. This latter is chosen by the eNB among
these values {-,-11,-10,-9,-8,-7,-6,-5,-4,-3,-2,-
1,0,+1,+2,+3}[dB] according to the interference status.















V. SELF OPTIMIZATION

To get benefit of the dynamic optimization, Self-
optimization usually takes place in operational state for the
network operators. For example to increase the robustness of
the network through mobility load balancing against
environmental challenges and along with it to reduce
operational costs by minimizing the manual optimization
steps. Below are some of the use cases that are used in self-
optimization:
1. Coverage and capacity optimization
2. Energy savings
3. Interference reduction
4. Mobility robustness optimization
5. Mobility load balancing optimization
6. RACH optimization
7. Inter-cell interference coordination






VI. LOAD BALANCING

Due to the non-uniform user distribution and a dynamic
cell environment, highly loaded cells are often located in the
vicinity of less loaded cells in communication networks. By
offloading traffic from heavily loaded cells to neighboring
lightly loaded cells, improvisation can be made in the overall
network performance and end-user experience. This
offloading can be achieved by changing the antenna or
handover parameters.




































A . Antenna based load balancing In antenna based load
balancing, optimization is done directly through adjusting
antenna parameters for adjacent cells coverage and capacity.
The parameters that are varied or controlled are tilt and
power level as shown in the figure below which results in a
very effective overall distribution of load. Usually this type of
approach is used in SON (Self Optimization Networks) and is
done manually. However, it can be made more effective and



4
efficient as well. The flowchart in the diagram below
describes the main algorithm than runs to cater for this
purpose.



















VII. CONCLUSION


This paper discusses some of the many factors that are
responsible in making an overall feasible and effective
network. By applying different techniques and algorithms, it
is possible to achieve a very high data rate however the basic
requirement of the network is to optimize it in a way that
mitigation is possible for every type of non favorable scenario.
Such techniques or policies may involve an overall shift to
some other well defined and parameterized communication
system but it does not fully cater for the purpose of optimizing
an existing network. Therefore OFDM provides a different
interference management techniques that can be further
divided into three main layers namely interference
randomization, interference cancellation and interference
coordination.


REFERENCES

[1] 3GPP, Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA): LTE
Physical Layer- General Description, TS 36.201 V8.3.0.
[2] 3GPP, Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA): Physical
Channels and Modulation, TS 36.211 V8.8.0.
[3] S. KUMAR et al., Autonomous Inter Cell Interference Avoidance under
Fractional Load for Downlink Long Term Evolution, 69th Vehicular
Technology Conference VTC,IEEE, Spring 2009.
[4] K. BEGAIN et al., Performance analysis of GSM networks with intelligent
underlay-overlay, International Symposium on Computers and
Communications, IEEE, 2002.
[6] Siemens, Interference mitigation Considerations and results on frequency
reuse, 3GPP Contribution R1-050599, 2005.
[7] Ericsson, Intercell Interference handling for E-UTRA, 3GPP Contribution
R1-050764, 2005.
[8] M. ASSAAD, Optimal Fractional Frequency Reuse (FFR) in Multicellular
OFDMA System, 68th Vehicular Technology Conference VTC,
IEEE, Fall 2008
[9] C.M. NECKER, Local interfernce coordination in cellular OFDMA
networks, IEEE 66th Vehicular Technology Conference, VTC-2007
Fall, IEEE, 2007.
[10]http://wwwen.zte.com.cn/endata/magazine/ztecommunications/2010Year/
no1/articles/201003/t20100321_181525.html
[11] http://tractool.seamcat.org/wiki/Manual/Scenario/OFDMA





AUTHORS

Hamza Gondal and Awais Aslam are students of 7
th
semester and
currently pursuing their degree in Telecommunication Engineering from
National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences (NUCES-FAST).
This research paper was thoroughly studied, raw data from various
research papers, online forums and links was collected and then
formulated into this research paper. The formatting of this paper in
addition to the collection of data was done by both the members of the
group. Mainly the formatting of the research paper and the collection of
data was done by both the group members who shared the workload
equally.