Interference management for 4G cellular standards [WIMAX/LTE UPDATE]

4G cellular standards are targeting aggressive spectrum reuse (frequency reuse 1) to achieve high system capacity and simplify radio network planning. The increase in system capacity comes at the expense of SINR degradation due to increased intercell interference, which severely impacts cell-edge user capacity and overall system throughput. Advanced interference management schemes are critical for achieving the required cell edge spectral efficiency targets and to provide ubiquity of user experience throughout the network. In this article we compare interference management solutions across the two main 4G standards: IEEE 802.16m (WiMAX) and 3GPP-LTE. Specifically, we address radio resource management schemes for interference mitigation, which include power control and adaptive fractional frequency reuse. Additional topics, such as interference management for multitier cellular deployments, heterogeneous architectures, and smart antenna schemes will be addressed in follow-up papers.