Maximum-weight scheduling with hierarchical modulation

In this paper, hierarchical modulation is used in conjunction with maximum-weight scheduling to achieve lower transmission delays. Via hierarchical modulation, the scheduled user has the option to transmit to two users simultaneously. The results are compared with classical single-layered transmission. Simulation results show that packet transmission delays are lowered without any loss in throughput. In addition to this, it is demonstrated that hierarchical modulation is robust in point-to-point settings, and prove to be as good as adaptive modulation techniques, without the need for transmitter side channel state information.