Exploiting Temporal Channel Correlation in Opportunistic SD-OFDMA

In opportunistic SDMA, the base station forms several random beams simultaneously and relies on fast but limited feedback for scheduling users on the beams. In this paper, opportunistic SDMA is applied to an OFDMA downlink by having independent beamformers run in parallel on different frequency bands (SD-OFDMA). A method for improving the performance of completely random beamforming is proposed and evaluated. It exploits the temporal channel correlation and the partial channel state information available at the transmitter to keep "successful" beams over longer periods of time than the default block duration. Extensive simulation results show a significant improvement in cell throughput compared to a completely random scheme. The results also show that in order to gain more from the multiple simultaneous beams than what is lost in additional interference, the system load must be high.