An energy-efficient game theoretic approach towards resource block and power allocation in femtocell networks

Abstract

This study investigates the joint resource block (RB) and power allocation in self-organized femtocell networks. Specifically, the concern here is to maximize the energy efficiency while minimizing the impact of interference in the network. The energy efficiency criterion that is incorporated in this study includes the transmission power and the circuit power. The joint allocation task is modeled as a non-cooperative game, in which the femto base stations are the players and RB and power levels are the actions that are associated with each player. In addition, the proposed non-cooperative game is demonstrated to exhibit pure and unique Nash Equilibrium. In order to minimize the complexity of the proposed non-cooperative game, the joint allocation task is decomposed into two sub problems: a RB allocation and a particle swarm optimization based power allocation. The analysis is carried out regarding energy efficiency and throughput of the femtocell network. Furthermore, the comparison with the traditional methods illustrates the superior performance of the proposed non-cooperative game.