Cross-layer stream provisioning scheme in massive MIMO cellular networks

Massive MIMO is a promising next-generation wireless access technology. By flexibly assigning different numbers of antennas among connections, the transmission rate can be adjusted according to user requirement and channel conditions. However, providing layer-encoded SVC multimedia streams with such a technology is challenging because each user's transmitting antennas and provided layers have to be considered simultaneously. In this paper, we propose a cross-layer scheme called Utility-Based Layer and Antenna Allocation (UB-LAA). Given the base-station's available antennas, and each user's channel conditions as well as subscribing SVC stream, UB-LAA decides each layer's serving base-station and transmitting antennas in order to maximize system's total utility. The simulation results indicate that under various circumstances, UB-LAA flexibly allocates resources to reflect user requirements and channel conditions, and performs very approximately to the optimal solution.