Link-adaptive largest-weighted-throughput packet scheduling for real-time traffics in wireless OFDM networks

The explosive growth of high-data-rate and multimedia real-time applications imposes new challenges on the design of future wireless communications systems. In this paper, a cross MAC-PHY layer link-adaptive largest-weighted-throughput packet scheduling algorithm is proposed to provide QoS guarantees to real-time traffics over wireless packet-switched networks. The proposed algorithm aims to satisfy the stringent packet delay constraints while obtaining a high system spectral efficiency. The objective is achieved by two interactive components: a MAC service discipline and a PHY rate-and-power adaptation scheme. It is demonstrated in the numerical results that the proposed algorithm significantly improves the system performance in terms of spectral efficiency and packet loss rate, thanks to the successful exploitation of the inherent system diversities in the time, frequency, and multiuser domains.