A novel ICIC scheme for reducing intra cluster interference in LTE-Hi network

In order to further improve the user experience in Hotspot or Indoor areas, Ultra-dense smallcell deployments in a new and high frequency band, e.g., 3.5 GHz, have been identified as a very interesting topic in Long Term Evolution—Hotspot or indoor (LTE-Hi) Release 12. The intra cluster interference among small cells becomes the main challenge instead of the cross layer interference for macro cell and small cell co-channel deployments. The traditional enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (eICIC) technology employing almost blank subframes (ABSs) and cell range extension (CRE) is no longer suitable for this challenge. A novel and effective time domain Orthogonal Subframe Partitioning and Adaptive Subframes Reuse (OSP+ASR) ICIC scheme is proposed to addresses the downlink intra cluster interference. The smallcells adaptively select their orthogonal subframes and reused subframes, according to the subframes configuration of the smallcells in their interference pool and their UEs' SINR respectively. System simulation results show that the proposed scheme can greatly improve the average smallcell throughput and the average SINR of smallcell users (SUEs), as well as the fairness of SUEs.