Self-Organized Scheme for Unique Cell ID Assignment during Femtocell Deployment

Abstract

Femtocell deployment has been a focus of wide research due to its potential to increase system capacity. There still are open challenges for the planning and management of femtocells caused by the potential interference issues that may arise when installing them under the coverage of larger cells (i.e., macrocells). This paper proposes a dynamic and self-organizing scheme based on the 3GPP standards. A centralized coordinator is deployed to enable the newly installed femtocell to avoid interference through acquiring a unique cell ID (PCI). Results show that the proposed scheme improves the management of small cell deployment and protects the control channels. By distributing PCIs uniquely, more efficient distributions and improved signal-to-noise interference ratio (SINR) have been achieved.