Delay-scheduler coupled throughput-fairness resource allocation algorithm in the long-term evolution wireless networks

Abstract

This study proposes a delay-scheduler coupled throughput-fairness resource allocation algorithm for users of mixed traffic in a long-term evolution (LTE) wireless network. The design objective is to maintain quality of services (QoSs) for real-time (RT) traffic as well as to provide throughput fairness for non-RT (NRT) applications. Instead of classifying packets as RT and NRT types like other methods do, the authors' scheme classifies packets as 'urgent' and 'non-urgent' for channel scheduling to optimise the tradeoff between RT, QoS and NRT throughput. The proposed scheme consists of two stages. In the first stage, the scheme determines the scheduling priorities of the 'urgent' packets to guarantee QoS for RT services. In the second stage, the authors' approach aims at providing fairness of channel utilisation for the 'non-urgent' traffic flows including NRT flows and the RT flows which are below the delay bonds. From the simulation results, it is shown that the proposed algorithm can effectively improve the QoS for RT users and achieve throughput fairness for NRT users by comparison with other approaches in the downlink transmission of LTE wireless networks.