Mitigating Signaling Requirements For MIMO with Frequency Domain Packet Scheduling

MIMO techniques in the spatial division multiplexing (SDM) mode have demonstrated tremendous performance potential when a single user link is considered. Recent studies have shown that frequency domain packet scheduling (FDPS) can provide a significant gain when combined with SDM (SDM-FDPS) by exploiting the multi-user diversity gain over frequency as well as the spatial domains. However, the increased signaling requirements in both uplink and downlink may prevent its practical use. In this paper several effective approaches are identified for reducing the signaling requirements for SDM-FDPS while still maintaining acceptable performance. Results show that the performance loss can be kept within 10% for a uplink signaling reduction of 88% and a downlink signaling reduction of 30%.