Fairness of link adaptation techniques in broadband wireless access networks

Link adaptation techniques, such as power control and adaptive coding and modulation, aim at maximizing the resource utilization in wireless networks. However, fair resource allocation must be taken into consideration, particularly in fixed broadband wireless access networks. The low/no mobility of users in such networks leads to location-dependent resource utilization, which can cause a significant variation in the performance from one user to another. For instance, adaptive coding and modulation schemes increase the average throughput in the network; however, they also increase the variation of the throughput. This is because users with good link quality always have high throughput, while users with bad link quality always have low throughput. The fairness and efficiency of various link adaptation techniques are analyzed. The analyzed algorithms are selected as a representative set of different link adaptation techniques with various fairness and efficiency characteristics.