Fairness Based Resource Allocation for Multi-User MIMO-OFDM Systems

This paper investigates the performance of a Weighted Proportional Fair (WPF) based resource allocation algorithm for future Multi-User (MU) Mulitple-Input Mulitple-Output (MIMO) Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple-Access (OFDMA) systems with frequency-selective broadband channels. In future networks algorithms should be designed to allocate the system's resources (time, frequency, space and power) in a manner that exploits multi-user diversity and ensures each user is treated fairly. The proposed algorithm extends the original Proportional Fair (PF) scheme, which was designed for single-antenna single-carrier systems, to the MIMO-OFDMA downlink such that individiual user's Quality of Service (QoS) requirements are satisfied in terms of requested bit-rate and bit error rate (BER). Monte Carlo simulation results indicates that extending the algorithm to a frequency- and space-division network produces the desirable characteristics of a fair and efficient algorithm.