The present invention relates to a radio communication system, especially relates to technique that controls the selection of a cell in a cellular radio communication system.
According to the band widening of radio communication, a multicarrier communication mode of dividing transmit information into plural frequency bands called a subcarrier to communicate is used. OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) in the multicarrier communication mode is adopted in various systems because a guard band between subcarriers is made unnecessary by utilizing the orthogonality of a signal, enhancing resistance to a delayed wave by narrowing bandwidth per subcarrier, and the high frequency efficiency can be realized. In addition, OFDMA (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access) for multiple access by dividing radio resources in the OFDM per unit called a resource block having fixed time length with one or plural subcarriers is adopted in a radio communication system called WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability of Microwave Access) and LTE (Long Term Evolution).
In addition, in the radio communication system, a user terminal can communicate by radio in a broad range by installing plural base stations which are hereinafter called a macrocell base station, which require great transmit power and a cover area per which ranges from a few hundred meters to a few kilometers for example. However, since a radio wave used for radio communication is obstructed or attenuated by a building and the like, an indoor location where a radio wave from a macrocell base station weakens occurs. Moreover, since the number of user terminals in an area increases as the cover area of a macrocell base station becomes wider, available radio resources to each user terminal decreases.
Therefore, a base station which is hereinafter called a small cell base station, which requires only small transmit power and a cover area per which is small is sometimes installed. A user terminal can also perform stable communication at a location where a radio wave from a macrocell base station weakens by installing the small cell base station, the number of user terminals per base station is reduced by assigning the user terminal the small cell base station, and available radio resources to each user terminal can be increased.
Generally, a user terminal selects a cell of which the received power is the strongest. However, it is desirable that many user terminals are assigned to a small cell base station to increase the traffic of the whole system. Therefore, a method and effect in which a user terminal selects a small cell base station even if its received power is not the strongest are described in 3GPP TSG-RAN WG1 #59 R1-010701, “Importance of Serving Cell Selection in Heterogeneous Networks”, Qualcomm Incorporated, January 2010.
For example, in the abovementioned document, it is described that the user terminal can acquire an advantage of the enhancement of throughput by selecting the small cell base station even if the received power is not the strongest. However, for example, as to upstream communication, since the communication of a terminal assigned a small cell base station functions as interference with the communication of a terminal assigned a macrocell base station and therefore the transmission speed of the terminal assigned the macrocell base station may be deteriorated, it is not necessarily related to the increase of the capacity of the whole system to assign multiple terminals to the small cell base station.
An object of the present invention is to settle the abovementioned problem and to provide a radio communication system, a base station and a cell selection control method respectively for increasing the capacity of the system by effectively utilizing a small cell base station.
To achieve the object, the present invention is based upon a radio communication system in which a terminal and a base station communicate by radio and provides the radio communication system where the base station is provided with plural antennas, measures processing gain using the plural antennas and adjusts a range in which the terminal is connected to a corresponding base station according to the processing gain.
In addition, to achieve the object, the present invention is based upon the base station of the radio communication system and provides the base station provided with plural antennas, a communication unit that communicates with a user terminal by radio, and a processor that measures processing gain using the plural antennas and adjusts a range in which the user terminal is connected to a corresponding base station according to the processing gain.
Further, to achieve the object, the present invention is based upon a cell selection control method of a base station and provides the cell selection control method in which the base station is provided with plural antennas, measures processing gain using the plural antennas, and adjusts a range where a terminal is connected to a corresponding base station according to the measured processing gain.
According to the present invention, a small cell base station is effectively utilized and the capacity of the radio communication system can be increased.
Referring to the drawings, embodiments of the present invention will be described below.
In the following description of the embodiments, a pilot signal denotes a signal having a fixed or semifixed pattern used as a reference signal in relation to amplitude and a phase when a received signal is demodulated or as a reference signal for estimating received power or propagation path information, and is also called a reference signal. In addition, a pilot signal used as a reference signal in demodulation and a pilot signal used as a reference signal for estimating received power or propagation path information may also be the same and may also be separate signals. In addition, a pilot signal may also be shared among plural user terminals in a cell and may also be individually used every user terminal.
Further, in the following embodiments, a flow of a sequence and processing may be described in specific order, except a case that there is such dependence upon order that a result of certain processing is used in the next processing, the order of processing may also be changed and processing may also be made in parallel. Further, in a case that a result of the execution of anterior processing is used for posterior processing, respective processing is also asynchronously executed and a result of the execution of the latest anterior processing at the time of execution may also be used for the posterior processing.
Furthermore, in the following embodiments, a base station the transmit power of which is relatively great and which communicates with terminals in a wide range is called a macrocell base station, a base station the transmit power of which is small and which communicates with terminals in a small range is called a small cell base station, and when the macrocell base station and the small cell base station are not required to be discriminated, they are merely called a base station.
The macrocell base station 101 is connected to the core network 104 via the network 103. The macrocell base station 101 transmits a downlink signal toward the user terminal 102 and receives an uplink signal transmitted by the user terminal 102. The small cell base station 111 is connected to the core network 104 via the network 103 like the macrocell base station 101, transmits a downlink signal toward the user terminal 112, and receives an uplink signal transmitted by the user terminal 112.
The network 103 to which the macrocell base station 101 is connected and the network 103 to which the small cell base station 111 is connected may also be the same network and may also be separate networks connected via a gateway. The core network 104 is provided with a function for mobility management and a gateway function with another network.
It is selected based upon the quality of the reception of a downlink signal or an uplink signal and propagation loss whether the user terminal 102 or 112 communicates with the macrocell base station 101 or the small cell base station 111, and when propagational environment varies because of the movement of the user terminal and the like, the base station to be communicated is selected again via the core network 104. In
In addition, at least one base station of the macrocell base station 101 and the small cell base station 111 is provided with plural antennas, and the selection of a cell and the adjustment of a criterion for reselection are performed by processing for correcting a cell selection bias value to be applied to the intensity in the reception of a reference signal to select the cell using gain acquired by signal processing using the plural antennas by the corresponding base station. As for the detailed configuration of the base station in the embodiment, one example will be described using
As shown in
The uplink interference elimination value 702 is acquired from processing gain by using the plural antennas. When an uplink signal from the individual user terminal is received in a process of received signal processing in the base station for example, the processing gain by using the plural antennas can be calculated based upon the received power of a signal received by the single antenna for example or the received power to interference and noise power ratio, and received power after signals received by the plural antennas are synthesized or the received power to interference and noise power ratio respectively. Average processing gain is acquired by averaging processing gain for an uplink signal from the individual user terminal among processing gain for plural user terminals and this is regarded as an uplink interference elimination value of the base station.
The channel estimator 901 estimates channel information showing the variation of a signal in a propagation channel every transmitting antenna, every receiving antenna, every frequency and every time utilizing the abovementioned pilot signal which is a signal of a well-known pattern included in the received signal. The channel estimator 901 also notifies the demodulator 902 of the estimated channel information. Further, the channel estimator 901 calculates received power to interference and noise power ratio 905 based upon the estimated channel information and notifies a processing gain output device 904.
The demodulator 902 executes processing for demodulating the received signal using the channel information notified from the channel estimator 901. The processing for demodulating the received signal is equalizing processing using a MMSE (minimum mean square error) method for example or is orthogonalizing processing using a result of the QR decomposition of the channel information for example. A result of the processing for demodulation in the demodulator 902 is transmitted to a likelihood estimating/error-correcting code decoding device 903. The likelihood estimating/error-correcting code decoding device 903 decodes an error-correcting code after the device estimates likelihood. The demodulator 902 also estimates each received signal after demodulation to interference and noise power ratio 906 using the result of the processing for demodulation and notifies the processing gain output device 904 of a result of estimation.
The processing gain output device 904 outputs the ratio of the received power to interference and the noise power ratio 905 respectively notified from the channel estimator 901 and the received power after demodulation to interference and the noise power ratio 906 respectively notified from the demodulator 902 as processing gain 907.
For the downlink interference elimination value 703 shown in
For the downlink interference elimination value 703, a value when the user terminal measures the difference between the quality of the reception in the user terminal of a signal which the base station individually transmits to the user terminal using the plural antennas and the quality of the reception in the user terminal of a signal which the base station broadcasts in the cell, and reports the value of the measured difference to the base station, may also be used. In this case, the higher the quality of the reception in the user terminal of the signal individually transmitted to the user terminal is, the larger value the downlink interference elimination value 703 becomes.
Next, as shown in
Next, in interference elimination information aggregating processing in a step P103 shown in
Next, in cell selection bias determining processing in a step P104 shown in
Next, in cell selection bias updating processing in a step P106 shown in
The abovementioned process is not required to be performed in the plural base stations in order in synchronization. For example, the interference elimination information aggregating processing P103 is not executed using the termination of the interference elimination information notifying processing P102 for a trigger but may also be executed using the information of interference elimination information from the peripheral base station for a trigger. In addition, the cell selection bias determining processing P104 is not executed using the termination of the interference elimination information aggregating processing P103 for a trigger but may also be periodically executed at a fixed interval.
Because of the process for correcting cell selection bias of this embodiment mentioned above, the higher the capability of downlink interference elimination of the corresponding base station is or the higher the capability of uplink interference elimination of the peripheral base station is, the more easily the user terminal can be connected to the corresponding base station by the abovementioned cell selection bias correcting process in this embodiment, and as a range of the cell of the corresponding base station is extended, the dispersion of a load between cells and the increase of system throughput are enabled, keeping an effect by interference between the cells low. Further, in environment in which a macrocell and a small cell exist together, the small cell can be effectively utilized.
In a step 503 in the cell selection bias determining processing, a central value of downlink interference values of the peripheral base stations is calculated based upon the downlink interference values of the peripheral base stations by selecting averaging processing and a median for example. In a step 504, a quantized downlink interference elimination value 507 is calculated based upon the central value of the downlink interference values of the peripheral base stations acquired in the step 503 and a downlink interference value of the corresponding base station. In this case, the quantized downlink interference elimination value 507 is selected so that the larger the central value of the downlink interference values of the peripheral base stations is than the downlink interference value of the corresponding base station, the larger the quantized downlink interference elimination value becomes and so that the smaller the central value of the downlink interference values of the peripheral base stations is than the downlink interference value of the corresponding base station, the smaller the quantized downlink interference elimination value becomes.
Next, in a step 505 in the cell selection bias determining processing, a cell selection bias value 508 is determined based upon the quantized uplink interference elimination value acquired in the step 502 and the quantized downlink interference elimination value acquired in the step 504.
In an initial state of the sequence shown in
The user terminal 112 measures received power based upon a pilot signal received from the base station in receiving/measuring processing 203 and reports a measurement result 204 to the connected macrocell base station 101 when the measurement result meets a predetermined condition such as when signal received power from the small cell base station 111 is higher than signal received power from the macrocell base station 101 after correction according to information included in the report signal.
In the receiving/measuring processing 203 in the user terminal 112, when the received power is compared, a cell individual offset value included in a report signal from the base station is corrected in addition to the received power. Hereby, a received signal from the base station having a high cell individual offset value is regarded as having great signal power. For example, even if a report of a measurement result is determined when signal received power from another base station is more than signal received power from the connected base station, the report of the measurement result is difficult because of the comparison after the addition of the cell individual offset value when the cell individual offset value of the connected base station is relatively large, and when the cell individual offset value of the connected base station is relatively small, the report of the measurement result becomes simple.
The macrocell base station 101 receives the report of the measurement result and determines whether handover to the small cell base station 111 is to be executed or not in handover determining processing 205. For the determination of handover, a degree of congestion of the handover source base station and the handover destination base station, the difference in received power between the reported measurement results and the like are used, and it is judged that the greater the received power from the handover destination base station of the reported received power is, the more easily the handover is executed. At this time, the judgment of handover is corrected so that the larger a cell selection bias value of the handover destination base station is, the more easily the handover is executed and so that the larger a cell selection bias value of the handover source base station, the more difficult it is to execute the handover.
The handover from the macrocell base station 101 to the small cell base station 111 is described above for an example. However, handover from the macrocell base station 101 to another macrocell base station 101, handover from the small cell base station 111 to the macrocell base station 101, and handover from the small cell base station 111 to another small cell base station 111 are also similar.
Although the handover is described above, cell reselection processing in non-communication of the user terminal is also similar. In addition, not handover of a type that completely switches to a connected cell but a case that transmit-receive base stations are switched in only a part of channel is also similar.
According to the abovementioned first embodiment, the small cell base station can be effectively utilized and the capacity of the radio communication system can be increased.
Next, a second embodiment in which cell selection bias values of plural base stations are collectively determined in a center will be described referring to
In
Interference elimination value measuring processing P101 shown in
In interference elimination information aggregating processing P113, interference elimination information notified in the interference elimination information notifying processing P102 from each base station is stored. When interference elimination information is newly notified from a base station the interference elimination information of which is already stored, the stored information is updated to be the newly notified information. Or when interference elimination information is newly notified from a base station the interference elimination information of which is already stored, an uplink interference elimination value and a downlink interference elimination value respectively in the stored interference elimination information, an uplink interference elimination value and a downlink interference elimination value respectively in the newly notified interference elimination information are averaged using a forgetting factor.
Next, in cell selection bias determining processing P114 shown in
In the cell selection bias determining processing P114 shown in
In cell selection bias notifying processing P115 shown in
Cell selection bias updating processing P106 shown in
The abovementioned processing is not required to be executed in order in synchronization in plural base stations. For example, the cell selection bias determining processing P114 is not executed using the termination of the interference elimination information aggregating processing P113 for a trigger but may also be regularly executed at a fixed interval.
Also in this embodiment as in the first embodiment, by the cell selection bias correcting process in the second embodiment, the higher the ability of downlink interference elimination of the corresponding base station is or the higher the ability of uplink interference elimination of its peripheral base station is, the more easily a user terminal can be connected to the corresponding base station, and a load between cells is dispersed while keeping an effect by interference between the cells low because a range of the cell of the corresponding base station is extended, and the throughput of the system can be increased. Further, in environment in which a macrocell and a microcell exist together, the microcell can be effectively utilized.
Each processing shown in
The network interface (I/F) 404 inputs/outputs a control signal, a transmitted signal before signal processing and a received signal after signal processing. The RF module 405 converts a transmitted signal to a signal in a radio-frequency band, transmits it via the antenna, and converts a signal received via the antenna to a signal in a base band.
Each module and the bus shown in
In addition, for example, if the CPU/DSP module 401 configuring the processor can execute operation for signal processing and the control of signal processing in all functions, the logic circuit module 403 may also be omitted. Conversely, if the logic circuit module 403 can execute operation for signal processing and the control of signal processing in all functions, the CPU/DSP module 401 may also be omitted.
The present invention is not limited to the abovementioned embodiments and various variations are included. For example, the abovementioned embodiments are detailedly described to understand the present invention better and the present invention is not necessarily provided with all the described configurations. In addition, a part of the configuration in the certain embodiment can be replaced with the configuration in another embodiment and the configuration in the other embodiment can be added to the configuration in the certain embodiment. Further, the other configuration can be added, deleted or replaced to/with a part of the configuration in each embodiment.
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
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PCT/JP2012/080968 | 11/29/2012 | WO | 00 |