Power-efficient downlink transmission in multicell networks with limited wireless backhaul

This article shows that division of a cell into tiers of smaller cells reduces power consumption. However, using the same frequency-time resources within multiple divided cells causes strong intercell interference. Given this circumstance, three beamforming techniques for multicell networks are presented to tackle the resultant challenging intercell interference environment. The schemes minimize the total transmit power across the coordinating base stations while simultaneously considering the quality of service of each user so that the latter is not unduly affected. Since the beamforming approaches require the circulation of information, an energy-efficient backhaul protocol is demonstrated.