1144
6, JUNE 2013
A Distributed Method of Inter-Cell Interference Coordination (ICIC)
Based on Dual Decomposition for Interference-Limited Cellular Networks
Chrysovalantis Kosta, Bernard Hunt, Atta UI Quddus, and, Rahim Tafazolli, Member, IEEE
Abstract—In this paper we present a novel distributed Inter-
Cell Interference Coordination (ICIC) scheme for interference-
limited heterogeneous cellular networks (HetNet). We reformu-
late our problem in such a way that it can be decomposed into
a number of small sub-problems, which can be solved indepen-
dently through an iterative subgradient method. The proposed
dual decomposition method can also address problems with
binary-valued variables. The proposed algorithm is compared
with some reference schemes in terms of cell-edge and total cell
throughput.
Index Terms—Inter-cell RRM, interference avoid-
ance/coordination, ICIC, linear programming optimization, dual
decomposition.
I. I NTRODUCTION
E ACH new mobile cellular system generation may provide
a breakthrough in maximum user data throughput. How-
ever, no mobile system so far has guaranteed an achievable
high data rate for the most disadvantaged members of the
network, namely, cell-edge users. Cell-edge users experience
not only a high propagation loss in their own cell, but
also they receive considerable inter-cell interference from the
neighboring cells.
Inter-cell interference can be mitigated by an intelligent
radio resource management (RRM) which spans across all
cells in a network [1]. By virtue of optimization, the inter-
cell RRM can be seen as a knapsack problem which is a
non-convex optimization problem [2]. Generally, solutions that
have exponential requirements (resource, time & complexity)
with only a constant increase in the problem size, are unattrac-
tive. Thus, the search for an efficient sub-optimal algorithm
that may solve a non-convex problem in a polynomial way is
considered very important.
A centralized formulation of inter-cell RRM through Inter-
Cell Interference Coordination (ICIC) which achieves a global
optimum for OFDMA-based networks is proposed in [3] based
on an ICIC approach in [4]. However, the global ICIC scheme
is unsuitable for large-scale systems, such as heterogeneous
network (HetNets), because of the complexity of coordina-
tion across macro and small cell layers (pico, femto) due
to unplanned deployment of the latter. Several distributed
approaches proposed in the literature may simplify the inter-
cell RRM problem, e.g. by dividing the user scheduling into
two phases (i.e., cell-edge and cell-centre user scheduling) [5].
Another way to simplify the problem is by allowing a small
ratio of active cells (clusters) to transmit simultaneously in
order to mitigate inter-cluster interference [5]. Recently, the
Manuscript received January 30, 2013. The assciate editor coordinating the
review of this letter and approving it for publication was I. Guvenc.
The authors are with the Department of Electronic Engineering, Centre for
Communication Systems Research (CCSR), University of Surrey, Guildford,
United Kingdom (e-mail: c.kosta@surrey.ac.uk).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LCOMM.2013.040913.130224
1089-7798/13$31.00 
c 2013 IEEE
IEEE COMMUNICATIONS LETTERS, VOL. 17, NO.
employment of discrete [7] rather than continuous [8] power
control has become a promising and effective way to control
and mitigate inter-cell interference. However, because a multi-
level power control technique requires large information ex-
change [7], it may not be appropriate in a random deployment
of small-cells. Another disadvantage of some distributed solu-
tions [7], [8] in the literature is that they have a non-negligible
performance gap compared with a centralized algorithm due to
their convergence to a local optimum. Furthermore, they usu-
ally improve only one performance metric at a time, i.e., either
the cell-edge throughput or the total cell throughput [6]. In this
paper, we present a distributed ICIC algorithm applicable to
HetNet cellular deployments, which is solved via a novel dual
decomposition approach. Most dual decomposition methods
[9] are effective only for linear problems with real variables,
thus we propose a new method to address problems with
binary-valued variables. Through extensive simulation results,
we show that this novel approach minimizes the performance
gap between the distributed and the semi-centralized solution
as the number of iterations increases. In addition, we compare
the performance of our distributed algorithm with a number
of reference schemes in terms of cell-edge and total cell
throughput.
II. S YSTEM M ODEL
We consider an OFDMA-based LTE downlink system. Let
S denote the set of inter-connected eNodeBs (eNBs) by using
an X2 communication interface [1], K denote the set of
User Equipment (UEs) and N denote the set of Resource
Blocks (RBs). The instantaneous Signal-to-Interference and
Noise Ratio (SINR) γk,ni
that can be achieved is calculated as
follows:
Pni · Hk,n
i
i, j ∈ S
i
γk,n =  j j , (1)
Pn · hk,n + Nw n ∈ N, k ∈ K
j=i
i
Here, Hk,n denotes the desired channel gain that UE k
experiences from eNB i at RB n including all long-term and
short-term channel-fading characteristics. In a similar way,
hjk,n denotes the interfering link. Pni and Pnj are the transmit
powers allocated to RB n by eNB i and j, respectively. Nw
stands for the average thermal noise power in each RB. To
i
convert the achievable SINR γk,n into an effective data rate
i
rk,n , we assume a log-linear function [10] as follows:
 
i
rk,n = B · log2 1 + γk,ni
, (2)
where B is the bandwidth allocated in a RB.
III. P ROPOSED ICIC M ECHANISM
In order to reduce the complexity with minimum loss to the
optimality, we divide the multi-cell RRM problem into two
independent problems (ref. Appendix A) i.e., the ‘assignment
KOSTA et al.: A DISTRIBUTED METHOD OF INTER-CELL INTERFERENCE COORDINATION (ICIC) BASED ON DUAL DECOMPOSITION . . . 1145

problem’ and the ‘transmit power problem’. The assignment not transmit (ρi,m=1 = 0). The optimization problem in (4)
problem decides which user is to be scheduled to which RB. will maximize the network utility based on the user selection
The transmit power problem decides the level of transmit in (3b).
power P i and interfering transmit power P j that best satisfies
the given constraint. The complication regarding the P i and B. Linear problem formulation and relaxation
P j is as follows; once an optimal P i is reached, it may no
longer be optimal when the P j has adjusted to the changes In order to reduce the complexity involved with the non-
resulting from inter-cell interference. linear expression in (4c), we may reformulate it to this:
ρ,m = ρj,m + ρk,m . (5)
j,k∈
A. Problem formulation
Now the reformulated problem is a special case (i.e., a problem
In a multi-user interference-limited system, the binary with totally unimodular matrix specifications) whose relaxed
power allocation policy maximizes the total data rate [11]. solution is also the optimal solution to the initial problem.
As the transmit power of each RB can be allocated to either This means that there is a small integrality gap2 between the
maximum transmit power or zero transmit power, we may reformulated problem and its relaxation. Linear programming
substitute the two complex variables P i and P j with one relaxation is a problem that arises when binary variables
joint equivalent variable. Therefore, we consider only these are replaced with real variables belonging to interval [0, 1].
two cases (transmit/not transmit) to calculate the achievable Therefore, the variables in (4d) may be relaxed as:
user data rate. We assume that the served users are able to 
ρi,m , ρj,m ,ρk,m , ρm ∈ [0, 1]. (6)
estimate the separate levels for strong sources of interference m
by employing cell-specific orthogonal reference sequences in The small integrality gap of the reformulated problem can be
the LTE standard [1]. In addition, let m ∈ M denote the reduced by introducing a number of tighter cuts3 as follows:
index up to which (0th , 1st , 2nd , ) dominant interfering eNB
ρ ≤ b, ρ ∈ [0, 1],  ∈ S, b = || /2 , (7)
is mitigated. Then, let U denote a utility metric which is
formulated as follows: where  is the set of eNBs where the cutting plane method is
i,m i,m r̂ applied and b is the lower integral part of the cardinality (| |)
Uk,n = rk,n · dk ; dk = ; m ∈ M, (3a)
rˆk of  divided by 2. Finally, a slack variable y may be added to
where r̂ is the average throughput across all UEs1 , rˆk is the the inequality constraint in (7) to transform it to an equality
average throughput of UE k and dk is the user demand to as follows:
provide a network-wide fairness. In this way, the utility metric ρ + y = b, y ∈ [0, 1]. (8)
i,m
Uk,n can describe the additional gain by mitigating up to
the m dominant interfering eNBs. Afterwards, the assignment
IV. P ROPOSED D UAL D ECOMPOSITION M ETHOD
problem for each RB n is solved by selecting the best user
K  with the highest utility price as
 follows:
 One main disadvantage of the semi-centralized problem is
 that is still highly dependent upon a centralized processing en-
K = arg max Uki,m . (3b)
k∈K tity which requires a large amount of the network information
Next, the transmit power problem is formulated for each RB exchange. Therefore, we may distribute further the complexity
n as follows:   of the relaxed semi-centralized problem in (4) into a number
maximize U i,m · ρi,m ; (4a) of independent sub-problems via dual decomposition [9] as
i∈S m∈M follows:    i,m i,m i,m  i,m ,m 
subject to ρ i,m ,m
+ρ = 1; (4b)  U ·ρ −λ ρ +ρ −1
  L(ρ, λ)= m∈M    ;
,m
ρ = min ρj,m + ρk,m , 1 ; (4c) i∈S −λ ρ + y − b
z i
j,k∈
     i 
i,m j,m k,m
ρ ,ρ ,ρ , ρm ∈ {0, 1}. (4d) = Li ρi,m , y i , λi,m , λz + λ + λz · b ,
m i∈S i∈S
(9)
i,m
Let ρ denote the binary variable whether the eNB i may where λi , λz > 0 is the Lagrange multipliers or dual variables
transmit (ρi,m = 1) or not (ρi,m = 0) in the case where up associated with the constraints in (4b) and (8), respectively. Let
to the m dominant interfering eNBs are mitigated. Also, let z denote the index of the cutting plane equations. Therefore,
i,m denote the set of different eNBs where the eNB i is in λz is the dual variable associated with the equation z. λi,m is
conflict when they mitigate up to the m dominant interfering calculated using the dual variable λi and λj with respect to
eNBs. For example, i,m = {j, k} infers that both eNB j, k ∈ i,m as follows:
S find the eNB i as their 1st dominant interfering eNB. Note λi m=0
that for simplicity, the i,m is referred to as . Consequently, λi,m = λj m = 0 . (10)
eNB j and eNB k may transmit in the case where m = 1 j∈(i,m)

(ρ,m=1 = 1); when their dominant interfering eNB i does The main network problem is now reformulated as:

1 The user demand may also be defined by using the average throughput 2 The Integrality gap is defined as the maximum ratio between the solution

across served UEs, however this provides only local fairness. In order to avoid quality of the binary/integer problem and of its relaxation
inter-cell signaling, the average throughput across all UEs may be a constant 3 Cuts are a number of additional constraints that may be added to the
network parameter, which can be optimized over time. relaxed problem in order to restrict fractional solutions.
1146 IEEE COMMUNICATIONS LETTERS, VOL. 17, NO. 6, JUNE 2013

TABLE I TABLE II
M AIN S YSTEM S IMULATION PARAMETERS P ERFORMANCE IN M ACROCELLS (G AIN /L OSS )

PARAMETER ASSUMPTION OR VALUE NUMBER OF SECTOR THROUGHPUT 5TH –ILE USER

SCHEME
2-tier tri-sectorized sites (19-sites) ITERATIONS (t) IN MBPS THROUGHPUT IN KBPS
Macro deployment ZHANG [7] ∞ 13.55 (16.5%) 334.4 (38.4%)
with a total of 57 eNBs
Block type: 5x5 grid ABAII [8] ∞ 13.52 (16.3%) 335.3 (38.8%)
Femto deployment
House dimensions: 10x10 m2
DYN FR3 9.69 (-16.7%) 333.5 (38.1%)
Total bandwidth 10 MHz (50 RBs) N/A
CENTRAL [3] 13.89 (19.4) 338.8 (40.3%)
Total eNB/HeNB Power 43 dBm / 10 dBm
REF2 - SEMI ∞ 13.74 (16.6%) 333.8 (38.2%)
Outdoor path loss model L = 128.1 + 37.6 log 10 (R), R[KM]
20 13.72 (16.5%) 333.5 (38.1%)
Indoor path loss model L = 127 + 30 log 10 (R), R[KM] 10 13.65 (15.9%) 331.7 (37.3%)
External wall penetration loss 30dB 5 13.37 (13.5%) 323.2 (33.9%)
User Noise figure/ thermal noise 9 dB/ −174 dBm PROP
3 12.97 (10.1%) 310.6 (28.6%)
Simulation time/drops 500 TTIs / 200 drops 2 12.52 (6.29%) 298.1 (23.5%)
Num of eNB/HeNB UEs per host 10 / 1 1 11.78 (1.22%) 280.1 (16%)
Femto deployment /activation ratio 0.1/1.0 REF1- FR1 0 11.63 241.5
Traffic Scenario Full buffer
TABLE III
P ERFORMANCE IN F EMTOCELLS (G AIN /L OSS )
  
maximize g(λ) = g i (λ) + λi + λz · b ; (11a) NUMBER OF CELL THROUGHPUT 5TH –ILE USER
SCHEME
i∈S i∈S ITERATIONS (t) IN MBPS THROUGHPUT IN KBPS
ZHANG [7] ∞ 20.08 (11.3%) 1245 (1794%)
subject to λ, λi , λ ≥ 0,
z
(11b)

 ABAII [8] ∞ 18.52 (2.66%) 1166 (1674%)
where g i (λ) = Li ρi,m∗ (λ
i,m
), y∗i (λz ), λi,m , λz . DYN FR3 12.76 (-29.3%) 800 (1117%)
N/A
ρ∗ i,m (λi,m ) and y∗ i (λz ) are the optimal primal variables of CENTRAL [3] 21.12 (17.07) 1515 (2205%)

the independent subproblem Li and are unique due to strict REF2 - SEMI ∞ 21.10 (17.0%) 1496 (2177%)
20 21.03 (16.6%) 1470 (2138%)
concavity of the log-transformed U which can be calculated
as:   
10 20.91 (15.9%) 1447 (2102%)
i,m i,m  U i,m·ρi,m−λi,m ρi,m+ρ,m−1 5 20.7 (14.8%) 1422 (2064%)
ρ∗ λ arg max   . PROP
& = (C) −λz ρ + y i − b (12)
3 20.45 (13.4%) 1417 (2057%)
   m 2 20.11 (11.5%) 1411 (2047%)
y∗i λi (C) : ρi,m ∈ [0, 1]; y i ∈ [0, 1]; ρ = 1, 1 19.48 (7.99%) 1224 (1763%)
m∈M
REF1- FR1 0 18.04 65.7
To calculate λ, the following subgradient may be used,
   
λi (t + 1) = λi (t)−β·g i + ; λz (t + 1) = λz (t) − β · g i +, (13)
low-power HeNB (Home eNB) network is implemented to
where [ ]+ is the projection on the non-negative orthant and
simulate a HetNet scenario. Table I gives the main simulation
is a positive iterative step size.
parameters used. We observe two performance metrics, i.e.
The advantage of using the dual decomposition method to
the cell throughput and the 5th percentile (5th -ile) point
distribute the semi-centralized algorithm is to limit the inter-
of Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF) of UE through-
cell signalling required to converge the algorithm.
put. Table II and Table III present the performance of the
Theorem 1: The iterative algorithm will converge to the
proposed algorithm (‘P ROP ’) for macrocells and femtocells,
semi-centralized solution with a large number of iterations.
respectively, where some comparison (reference) schemes are
Proof : The log-linear operating mapping function in (2) is
also included. The ‘R EF 1’ employs full frequency reuse and
i
convex [10], so a unique rk,n ∗ exists for γk,n
i
. In a similar way,
its performance is equivalent when the number of iterations
the solution of the log-transformed U in (12) is unique. Then,
executed by our proposed algorithm is set to zero. Because
if the iteration step size β is sufficiently small, as t → ∞,
its performance is increased if the number of iterations is
the duality gap between the relaxed problem and its dual will
also increased, this relative gain is displayed in the table
converge to zero.
with respect to the ‘R EF 1’. On the other hand, ‘S EMI ’ is
Algorithm 1: To be executed by eNB i for each RB n.
the semi-centralized solution without the dual decomposition.
Initialization: Calculate the U i,m , ρ , b, λi , λi,m and λz .
According to the theorem 1, the gap between ‘S EMI ’ and the
For each iteration 1, ..., Maximum iteration step :
proposed iterative scheme should converge to zero for a large
• Solve the equation in (12).
number of iterations (infinity). Other comparison schemes
• Calculate subgradient step in (13).
include: dynamic FR3 (‘DYN FR3’), the centralized solution
• Update the subgradients ( λi and λz ).
(‘C ENTRAL’) as proposed in [3], the algorithms ‘Z HANG ’
• Exchange subgradients to all eNBs involved.
[8] and ‘A BAII ’ [9] which can also be implemented in a
Termination: Stop if the maximum iteration step is reached.
distributed way. The latter two algorithms employ inter-cell
power control (continuous [7] or discrete [8]) to achieve a
V. S IMULATION S TUDY & R ESULTS maximum radio resource utilization and quality of service
The simulation study is performed in the downlink using (QoS). As mentioned earlier, performance degradation can
a modified version of the LTE-based system-level simulator be seen in dense interference-limited systems using a non-
[12]. Apart from the outdoor eNB network, a closed-access binary power allocation plan. This can be observed particularly
KOSTA et al.: A DISTRIBUTED METHOD OF INTER-CELL INTERFERENCE COORDINATION (ICIC) BASED ON DUAL DECOMPOSITION . . .
TABLE IV
S IGNALING & C OMPLEXITY C OMPARISON (P ER I TERATION )
INFORMATION EXCHANGE REQUIRED
ALGORITHM
OVER X2 INTERFACE COMPUTATIONS
ZHANG [7] 4 Variables (d k , Pi, L 1 , L 2 ) |K| + |S|˜2
PROP 2 Variables (Ȝ, ȡȚ,m) |M|+1
in the case of femtocells. Additionally, it can be observed
that their performances are proposed for macro deployments.
However, we can also observe that the compared distributed
algorithms may converge to a local optimum rather than the
global optimum. Our algorithm shows its performance both
in macro and femto deployments. The relative gain indicates
the adaptability of the algorithm to the current deployment.
In the case of femtocells, 1 or 2 iterations may be sufficient
to mitigate the detrimental inter-cell interference. However, in
the case of macrocell performance improvement can be seen
with a higher number of iterations which can vary from 3 to 5.
The ‘C ENTRAL’ scheme shows the peak performance that can
be achieved by using a centralized algorithm. By assuming a
semi-centralized approach, only a negligible performance gap
can be seen (between ‘C ENTRAL’ and ‘S EMI ’). This is due
to the small correlation of the ‘assignment problem’ with the
‘power transmit problem’.
VI. C OMPLEXITY A NALYSIS
We provide a brief overview of the complexity and signaling
overhead of the evaluated algorithms. For simplicity, we do
not account for the complexity in channel status information
since all schemes require this information. By default, all
centralized algorithms (i.e. ‘C ENTRAL’ & ‘DYN FR3’) must
have a common processing entity in order to reach the final
solution and distribute this to all parts of the network. The
distributed algorithms in [7], [8] are implemented without a
centralized entity at the cost of excessive inter-cell signaling.
As a result, it is required to compute multiple sub-versions
of the centralized problem (own cell & neighboring cells).
For example, the distributed algorithm in [7] exchanges four
variables with all eNBs over X2 interface (i.e. user demand
dk , eNB transmit power P i and two SINR components (L1
& L2 )) in order to reconstruct the weighted sum rate (utility
metric). Furthermore, it is required to solve two sub-problems
at each iteration (i.e. user assignment and transmit power
(on/off) which requires |K| and |S|·2 computations, respec-
tively). Table IV gives a signalling and complexity comparison
of the proposed dual algorithm and Zhang’s algorithm in
terms of information exchange and required computations (per
iteration). The complexity and the signaling overhead of our
distributed algorithm is reduced to a minimum by collecting
only the necessary information in order to converge to the
semi-centralized solution. Note, that the network-wide user
demand dk is incorporated into the dual λ variable. Each eNB
solves its own problem with respect to this exchanged variable
which requires |M | + 1 computations (including the case ‘do
not transmit’).
VII. C ONCLUSION
In this paper, a novel distributed ICIC has been presented
for heterogeneous multi-cell cellular networks. The proposed
1147
algorithm solves the problem iteratively by employing a re-
vised dual decomposition method which can address binary
variables. Simulation activities show the effectiveness of the
algorithm with a small number of iterations especially in the
case of femtocell, which would otherwise suffer heavily from
inter-cell interference due to their asymmetric deployment.
A PPENDIX A
D ECOMPOSITION OF THE C ENTRALIZED RRM P ROBLEM
The complexity of a centralized problem may be shifted
to other network entities (i.e. eNBs) at the cost of inter-
cell signaling. Given that the intra-cell (adjacent-channel)
interference is avoided in OFDMA systems, our problem is
limited to the inter-cell (co-channel) interference. For sim-
plicity of illustration, the notation of the RB n is omitted.
Therefore, the centralized problem, which includes all the
network information, is as follows:
   i,m i,m
Umax = max U k · ρk
i∈S m∈M k∈K
 
  
Umax = max max U i,m
·ρ i,m
Assignment i,m
=Uki,m i∈S m∈M
Problem→ U
k∈K
  
Power transmit problem
The centralized problem is equal to the maximization of
the maximized subproblems as shown above. We may reduce
the signaling overheads with minimum loss of optimality by
selecting the best user (i.e. K = K  ) in each power transmit
problem with the argmax in (3b).
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