Distributed Power Control for Spectrum-Sharing Femtocell Networks Using Stackelberg Game

In this paper, we investigate the distributed power allocation strategies for a spectrum-sharing femtocell network, where a central macrocell underlaid with several femtocells. Assuming that the macrocell protects itself by pricing the interference from the femtocells, a Stackelberg game is formulated to jointly consider the utility maximization of the macrocell and the femtocells. Then, the Stackelberg equilibrium for the proposed game is studied, and an effective distributed interference price bargaining algorithm with guaranteed convergency is proposed to achieve the equilibrium. Numerical examples are then presented to verify the proposed studies. It is shown that the algorithm is effective in distributed power allocation and macrocell protection requiring minimal network overhead for spectrum-sharing-based two-tier femtocell networks.