An efficient algorithm for distributed power control in cellular radio systems

In most modern cellular radio systems, efficient interference management aims at acceptable carrier-to-interference (CIR) ratios in all active communication links in the system. Power control is an integral technique in the design and operation of such cellular radio systems. It can be used to reduce cochannel interference and hence the near-far effects. Two main approaches have been adopted for power control, which are known as centralized and distributed. Centralised power control requires knowledge of the information of all link gains between base stations and mobiles, which is very difficult to implement for large real-time systems. We consider distributed power control algorithms, which are based only on local information at the base station. A new technique, based on the method of projection onto convex sets (POCS), is developed and is used to obtain the minimum protection ratio. Simulation results show that the POCS method achieves much faster convergence and improved outage probability than other conventional methods.