Satellite access points selection for cell-free LEO networks

Abstract

The proliferation of dense Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellations demands advanced architectures to manage their dynamic nature. This paper investigates a reconfigurable cell-free massive MIMO (CF-mMIMO) framework to overcome the limitations of static clustering. We develop optimization schemes using the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM), bisection, and interior-point methods to dynamically select satellite access points (SAPs) that maximize downlink sum-rate, uplink max–min fairness, and energy efficiency. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed dynamic selection schemes yield substantial performance gains. Notably, our approach improves the downlink sum-rate by over 250% compared to a traditional single-satellite serving architecture. These findings validate dynamic clustering as a scalable and effective strategy for next-generation LEO systems.