Distributed Utility Optimization in Vehicular Communication Systems

Abstract: In this paper, we study the problem of utility maximization in the uplink of vehicle-to-infrastructure communication systems. The studied scenarios consider four practical aspects of mobile radio communication links: i) Interference between adjacent channels, ii) interference between roadside units along the way, iii) fast and slow channel fadings, and iv) Doppler shift effects. We present first the system model for the IEEE 802.11p standard, which considers a communication network between vehicles and roadside infrastructure. Next, we formulate the problem of utility maximization in the network, and propose a distributed optimization scheme. This distributed scheme is based on a two-loop feedback configuration, where an outer-loop establishes the optimal signal to interference-noise ratio (SINR) that maximizes the utility function per vehicle and defines a quality-of-service objective. Meanwhile, inner-control loops adjust the transmission power to achieve this optimal SINR reference in each vehicle node regardless of interference, time-varying channel profiles and network latency. The computation complexity of the distributed utility maximization scheme is analyzed for each feedback loop. Simulation results indicate that the proposed scheme reaches the objective SINRs that maximize utility and improve energy efficiency in the network with a low time cost. The results also show that the maximum utility is consistently achieved for different propagation scenarios inside the vehicular communication network.