Constructing optimal virtual cellular networks for nonuniformly distributed base stations
Guangbin Fan, Jingyuan Zhang · Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing · 2003
Abstract In a cellular network, the cell size varies from area to area, and the base stations may not be uniformly distributed. For example, in a well‐populated city, the cell size may be smaller than that in a rural area. It is harder to study the performance of a nonuniform cellular network. By imposing a virtual uniform cellular network on the nonuniform cellular network, some performance issues of the nonuniform network can be studied using the imposed virtual one. In the imposed virtual cellular network, each virtual cell cannot contain more than one base station. This paper has proposed algorithms to construct optimal virtual cellular networks for nonuniformly distributed base stations. The constructed virtual cellular networks are optimal in the sense that their corresponding uniform cell sizes reach the largest possible. The main advantage of constructing the optimal virtual cellular network is that the number of virtual cells required to cover the service area is minimized. The algorithm works for mesh networks as well as for honeycomb networks. On the basis of a novel concept, referred to as the projection locus, both kinds of optimal virtual cellular networks can be constructed in O(nlog n) time for n nonuniformly distributed base stations. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.