Modulation and Coding Scheme Selection in MBSFN-enabled LTE Networks

Long Term Evolution (LTE) constitutes the next-generation cellular network beyond 3G that is designed to support the explosion in demand for bandwidth-hungry multimedia services in wireless networks by providing an extremely high performance radio-access technology. To support Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Services (MBMS), LTE offers the functionality to transmit MBMS over Single Frequency Network (MBSFN), where a time-synchronized common waveform is transmitted from multiple cells for a given duration. This enables overthe-air combining, thus significantly improving the Spectral Efficiency (SE) compared to conventional MBMS operation. In MBSFN transmissions, the achieved SE is mainly determined by the Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS) selected. This study proposes and evaluates four approaches for the selection of the MCS. Each approach corresponds to different users’ distribution and multimedia traffic conditions. Based on SE measurement, we determine the approach that either maximizes or achieves a target SE for the corresponding users’ distribution and traffic conditions. Modulation and Coding Scheme Selection in MBSFN-enabled LTE Networks Antonios Alexiou, Christos Bouras, Vasileios Kokkinos, Andreas Papazois, George Tsichritzis 1 Research Academic Computer Technology Institute 2 Computer Engineering and Informatics Department, University of Patras Patras, Greece alexiua@ceid.upatras. gr, bouras@cti.gr, kokkinos@cti.gr, papazois@ceid.upatras. gr, tsixritzis@cti.gr Abstract— Long Term Evolution (LTE) constitutes the next-generation cellular network beyond 3G that is designed to support the explosion in demand for bandwidth-hungry multimedia services in wireless networks by providing an extremely high performance radio-access technology. To support Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Services (MBMS), LTE offers the functionality to transmit MBMS over Single Frequency Network (MBSFN), where a time-synchronized common waveform is transmitted from multiple cells for a given duration. This enables over-the-air combining, thus significantly improving the Spectral Efficiency (SE) compared to conventional MBMS operation. In MBSFN transmissions, the achieved SE is mainly determined by the Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS) selected. This study proposes and evaluates four approaches for the selection of the MCS. Each approach corresponds to different users’ distribution and multimedia traffic conditions. Based on SE measurement, we determine the approach that either maximizes or achieves a target SE for the corresponding users’ distribution and traffic conditions. Long Term Evolution (LTE) constitutes the next-generation cellular network beyond 3G that is designed to support the explosion in demand for bandwidth-hungry multimedia services in wireless networks by providing an extremely high performance radio-access technology. To support Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Services (MBMS), LTE offers the functionality to transmit MBMS over Single Frequency Network (MBSFN), where a time-synchronized common waveform is transmitted from multiple cells for a given duration. This enables over-the-air combining, thus significantly improving the Spectral Efficiency (SE) compared to conventional MBMS operation. In MBSFN transmissions, the achieved SE is mainly determined by the Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS) selected. This study proposes and evaluates four approaches for the selection of the MCS. Each approach corresponds to different users’ distribution and multimedia traffic conditions. Based on SE measurement, we determine the approach that either maximizes or achieves a target SE for the corresponding users’ distribution and traffic conditions. Keywords-long term evolution; multimedia broadcast and multicast; single frequency network; spectral efficiency; modulation and coding scheme;