Cooperative game approach for scheduling in two-virtual-antenna cellular networks with Relay Stations fairness consideration

In this cellular network, Relay Stations (RSs) help to improve the system performance; however, little work has been done considering the fairness of RSs. In this paper, we study the cooperative game approaches for scheduling in the wireless relay networks with two-virtual-antenna array mode. After defining the metric of relay channel capacity, we form a cooperative game for scheduling and present the interpretation of three different utilization objectives physically and mathematically. Then, a Nash Bargaining Solution (NBS) is utilized for resource allocation considering the traffic load fairness for relays. After proving the existence and uniqueness of NBS in Cooperative Game (CG-NBS), we are able to resolve the resource allocation problem in the cellular relay network by the relay selection and subcarrier assignment policy and the power allocation algorithm for both RSs and UEs. Simulation results reveal that the proposed CG-NBS scheme achieves better tradeoff between relay fairness and system throughput than the conventional Maximal Rate Optimization and Maximal Minimal Fairness methods.