Dynamic Bandwidth Allocation in Small-Cell Networks: An Economics Approach

Abstract: We propose and experimentally demonstrate a bandwidth allocation method based on the comparative advantage of spectral efficiency among users in a multi-tone small-cell radio access system with frequency-selective fading channels. The method allocates frequency resources by ranking the comparative advantage of the spectrum measured at the receivers ends. It improves the overall spectral efficiency of the access system with low implementation complexity and independently of power loading. In a two-user wireless transmission experiment, we observe up to 23.1% average capacity improvement by using the proposed method.