Sub-channel assignment and resource scheduling for non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) in downlink coordinated multi-point systems

Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) has been considered as one of the key technologies to enhance spectral efficiency and the total throughput for the fifth generation (5G) systems. NOMA can be combined with coordinated multi-point (CoMP) transmission to improve the performance of cell edge users. For a network to benefit from CoMP, its utilisation of resources should be scheduled efficiently. This paper focuses on joint subchannel assignment and resource scheduling algorithm for NOMA with CoMP joint transmission (JT) scheme. Moreover, a comparison between proposed maximum throughput (MT) NOMA-CoMP and joint proportional fairness (JPF) scheduling with and without CoMP for different power and SINR based cell-edge criteria is investigated. From the system level simulation results it has been shown that the proposed maximum throughput (MT) NOMA-CoMP scheme together with user scheduling provides higher spectral efficiency compared with joint proportional fairness (JPF) scheduling algorithm under different criteria of making cell-edge decision.