SPECIAL SECTION ON SOCIALLY ENABLED NETWORKING AND COMPUTING

Received November 15, 2016, accepted December 3, 2016, date of publication December 15, 2016, date of current version January 23,
2017.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/ACCESS.2016.2640270

4-DMWM Approach for Caching Based Optimal

D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation: Centralized
and Distributed Algorithm Design
LU MIAO, BO BAI, (Member, IEEE), AND WEI CHEN, (Senior Member, IEEE)
Department of Electronic Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Corresponding author: L. Miao (miaol15@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn)
This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 61671269, Grant 61322111,
Grant 61321061, and Grant 61401249, in part by the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) under Grant
2013CB336600 and Grant 2012CB316000, and in part by the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of
Higher Education under Grant 20130002120001.

ABSTRACT Caching popular contents at mobile devices can potentially improve the quality of service
for mobile users and relieve traffic burden of base station in cellular networks. In this paper, we jointly
consider the resource allocation, the cached contents, and the distance between two devices for the optimal
device pairing problem in centralized and distributed cases, where the BS is the central controller in the
centralized case. The joint optimization problem of device-to-device (D2D) caching with channel allocation
is formulated as a weighted four-uniform hypergraph model. The optimal solution for the problem is
4-D maximum weighted matching (4-DMWM), which is NP-hard unfortunately. To approach the 4-DMWM
with low-complexity, we adopt the greedy algorithm and the squareIMP algorithm in the centralized case.
Moreover, distributed algorithms are also designed for the caching problem in both synchronous and
asynchronous cases. The simulation results will illustrate that the squareIMP algorithm can be used to get a
better transmission rate with the complexity of O(n5 ), while the greedy algorithm can be used in the case with
stringent latency requirement for centralized 4-DMWM problem. The sum rate of distributed asynchronous
algorithm is close to the centralized greedy algorithm with the complexity of O(n2 ) for each device.
However, the simulation result of the synchronous algorithm is slightly lower than the centralized algorithm,
where each device performs O(n2 ) computational operations in each iteration. Therefore, the algorithms
proposed in this paper can be used in different cases for solving optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation
problem.

INDEX TERMS D2D caching, weighted 4-uniform hypergraph, 4-dimensional maximum weighted
matching (4-DMWM), centralized algorithm, distributed algorithm.

I. INTRODUCTION In wireless networks, the content caching problem has

With the increasing of user number and the growth of the peak
traffic in base stations (BSs), device-to-device (D2D) com-
munication is expected to improve the resource utilization
efficiency and reduce peak traffic in BS by allowing mobile
devices to directly communicate with each other [1], [2]. Due
to the need for the throughput gain and the scarcity of wireless
spectrum resource, caching holds the promise of providing
substantial capacity gains by disseminating popular content
in the idle spectrum when the network is off-peak. Therefore,
accurately caching the user demanding contents in mobile
devices is one of the key issue to exploit the advantage of
D2D communication schemes [3].
attracted much attention from both academia and industry.
Caching aims to provide the spectral and energy efficiency
gain by paying storage resource as a cost. However, not
all the content items can be cached due to the buffer size.
The performance limit of wireless caching has been studied
in [4]. The fundamental limit of D2D caching was studied
in [5]. There are also many works focusing on practical
caching algorithms. In [6], the cache placement problem was
investigated in femtocell networks, where femtocell BSs act
as helpers to cache popular files. It is shown in [7] and
[8] that caching may efficiently reduce the outage proba-
bility and the average transmit power in wireless small-cell

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 L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
networks and device-to-device (D2D) networks respectively.
In [7], the caching performance was studied in terms of
outage probability and average delivery rate in wireless
small-cell networks, where the cache-enabled BSs are dis-
tributed according to a Poisson point process. In [8], the
throughput-outage tradeoff performance of wireless networks
was investigated by exploiting clustered device caching via
D2D communications. The caching and pushing problem
with a finite receiver buffer was studied in [9] and [10]. There
are many studies using matching algorithm for resource allo-
cation. In OFDMA systems, the problem of optimal subcar-
rier allocation can be solved by H-matching approach to min-
imize outage probability in [11]. To offload not only traffic
but also computation overhead, some distributed algorithms
are adopted by pushing computation and storage to network
edges for the caching problem in D2D network [12], [13].
A belief propagation based distributed algorithm was used to
solve the cache placement problem in [14]. In the distributed
system, the appropriate channel allocation can achieve a low
outage probability with low computation complexity [15].
To the best of our knowledge, however, these studies have
not considered the joint optimization problem of content
caching, resource allocation and device pairing to improve
the throughput in D2D networks.
In this paper, we consider the problem of caching based
optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation. In the con-
sidered system, each mobile device caches some popular
contents. 3GPP Proximity Services (ProSe) discovery can
provide registration of both services offered by devices, and
application requests of users in [16]. In the same way, a
device can get the content caching information of users in
D2D network. When some users request the contents, the sys-
tem will determine which device provides help and allocate
the channel at the same time, so as to maximize the system
throughput. Inspired by [17], the considered joint optimiza-
tion problem is first formulated as a weighted 4-uniform
hypergraph model. In this context, the optimal solution for the
caching based D2D pairing and channel allocation problem is
the 4-dimensional maximum weighted matching (4-DMWM)
in the weighted 4-uniform hypergraph. Unfortunately, the
multi-dimensional matching problem is NP-hard in general.
Therefore, we adopt some approximation algorithms in this
paper with low complexity in centralized and distributed
manners.
Recently proposed cloud radio access networks (Cloud-
RAN) is a typical centralized cloud computing-based archi-
tecture [18], while fog radio access networks (Fog-RAN)
is a distributed architecture that leverages caching capabil-
ities at the wireless edge nodes for cellular networks [19].
In [20] we focused our attention on the centralized 4-DMWM
problem under the control of BS. In the centralized case,
based on the squareIMP algorithm proposed in [21], we first
propose high performance algorithm with the complexity
of O(n5 ), which nearly achieves the optimal throughput of the
exhaustive search. Moreover, to fulfill the stringent latency
requirement, we further proposed a greedy based algorithm,
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which is shown to achieve the 1/2 optimal performance
in [22].
Usually, BS in centralized case is required to collect the
whole information of the network, which introduces much
overhead. However, coordination may not be possible with no
central controller exists in some self-organized networks [14].
Moreover, the underlay caching and interference manage-
ment algorithms often bring in much extra computation over-
head for the central controller. Therefore, we use distributed
algorithms to solve the caching based optimal D2D pairing
and channel allocation problem. In the distributed algorithm,
we consider synchronous and asynchronous scenarios for the
caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation
problem. A bipartite graph matching problem can be solved
in [23]. Inspired by [23], we convert the weighted 4-uniform
hypergraph to a weighted bipartite graph. After the trans-
formation, the 4-DMWM problem can be formulate as a
weighted bipartite graph matching problem with a little per-
formance loss in the distributed synchronous system. To solve
the weighted matching problem, belief propagation (BP) is
an effective algorithm that explained in [24] and [25]. In the
distributed synchronous system, a distributed synchronous
algorithm based on BP is proposed for the weighted bipar-
tite graph matching problem, so that we obtain the approxi-
mate solution for the 4-DMWM problem. In the distributed
synchronous algorithm, each device performs only O(n2 )
computational operations in each iteration. Moreover, in the
distributed asynchronous algorithm, the 4-DMWM problem
based on the weighted 4-uniform hypergraph can be trans-
formed into a maximum independent set (MIS) problem. We
search for each device and its neighbors to find the maximum
independent set of devices one by one in the distributed
asynchronous system. After that, we get the 4-DMWM result
with the complexity of O(n2 ) for each device. The distributed
algorithms in this paper are both low-complexity for the
caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation
problem.
The main contributions of this paper are summarized as
follows:
• We propose the D2D pairing and channel allocation
algorithm scheme based on the squareIMP and a greedy
algorithm to solve the caching based optimal D2D pair-
ing and channel allocation problem in the centralized
manner.
• In the distributed algorithm, there are synchronous and
asynchronous scenarios.
– In the distributed synchronous system, a distributed
synchronous algorithm based on BP is proposed
for optimal D2D pairing and caching with channel
allocation with low complexity.
– In distributed asynchronous system, a low complex-
ity distributed asynchronous algorithm is proposed
to solve the caching based optimal D2D pairing and
channel allocation problem.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows.
Section II presents the system model and problem
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L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
formulation. The hypergraph based centralized 4-DMWM
algorithm for caching based optimal D2D pairing and chan-
nel allocation is proposed in Section III. The distributed
synchronous and asynchronous algorithm for the caching
problem are discussed in Section IV. Section V illustrates
the simulation results. Finally, Section VI concludes the
paper.
FIGURE 1. Scenario for caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel
allocation in D2D network. The requester can get required content from
the helper via D2D links depends on whether the helper has the target
content, and whether the allocated resource block can support the whole
content transmission from the helper to the requester.
II. SYSTEM MODEL AND PROBLEM FORMULATION
A. SYSTEM MODEL
As shown in Fig. 1, the considered D2D communication
scenario consists of a BS and M devices where the index set of
devices is denoted by M = {1, . . . , M }. Each device caches
some popular contents. When a device requests a content
item, the system will allocate a channel and choose another
device to provide help at the same time. A communication
connection between two devices can be established when the
channel can support data exchange at a target transmission
rate. After the connection is established, the transmitter of
the communication link can deliver content data files to its
receiver. We denote the receiver and transmitter as requester
and helper respectively in our network. Each requester of the
network can select a helper based on whether the helper has
the target content, and whether the channel capacity between
these two devices is above the target transmission rate. We
select appropriate combinations of the device pairs, resource
blocks and contents to meet the above requirements.
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In our network, many pairs of devices send requests at
the same time. Therefore, we protect the device pairs from
interference by considering the resource allocation. Since
the underlay interference management algorithms often have
much extra computation overhead for the BS, a hierarchi-
cal overlay spectrum sharing and relay selection scheme
is proposed to avoid serious interference between cellular
devices in [13]. The BSs allocate interleaved resource blocks
to the entire D2D network at first. The interleaved subcar-
rier allocation scheme is adopt in both IEEE 802.16 and
LTE-A standards [26], [27]. The BS allocates the resource
blocks in different coherence bandwidths, so that different
resource blocks undergo independent channel fading. After
that the D2D network will obtain the full frequency diversity
according to [28]. We assume that the index set of resource
blocks is denoted by B, where B = {1, . . . , B}. Let hi be the
channel gain on the resource block b between the devices. The
channel gain follows a circular symmetric Gaussian distribu-
tion [29]. Suppose the resource block has a unit bandwidth.
The channel between two devices in D2D communications is
Rayleigh fading channel. In this case, we have:
yi = hi xi + zi , i = 1, 2, . . . , (1)
where xi , yi represent transmitter and receiver of D2D com-
munication respectively, and zi ∼ CN (0, σ 2 ) is the additive
white Gaussian noise between the transmitter and receiver.
We denote Pt as the transmit power of device in dBm. P(d) is
the function of the power at a distance d from the transmitter.
P(d) can be represent as
P(d) = Pt − α log(d) + α log(d0 ), (2)
where d0 is the standard distance between transmitter and
receiver, and α is the path loss exponent. Then the channel
capacity can be represented as
 
2 P(d)
Ci = log 1 + |hi | . (3)
σ2
Let r and l denote the index of requester and helper respec-
tively, where r, l ∈ M . We define P as an M × M × B array
with the (r, l, b)-th element pr,l,b to present the matching
between the pair of devices and the resource block:

 1, requester r delivers data to helper l
pr,l,b = by using resource block b, (4)
0, otherwise,

where the function indicates that a pair of requester and
helper can communicate by using a resource block in D2D
network. We set pr,l,b as 1 in the condition that the channel
capacity between the pair of r and l is larger than the target
transmission rate by using the resource block b.
Each device caches some contents in D2D network.
Suppose we have F popular contents. The index set of con-
tent can be expressed as F = {1, . . . , F}. The devices
exchange contents with its neighbors to offload traffic for
the BS. We define Q as an M × M × F array with the
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(r, l, f )-th element qr,l,f to explain the relation between a pair

of devices and a cache content item:

1, requester r delivers content f to helper l,
qr,l,f =
0, otherwise,
(5)
where the function indicates that a content helper can deliver
a content to the requester in D2D network. We set qr,l,f as 1
when the content item f is a required file of the requester r
and a cache file of the helper l.
In this paper, caching based optimal D2D pairing and
channel allocation is discussed in two scenarios as follows.
It is noted that, in both scenarios, the requester will try to
get the required content from adjacent helpers for traffic
offloading.

1) CASE 1 (CENTRALIZED CONTROL SCENARIO)

With the central controller, the BS has extra overhead for the
computation of the caching based optimal D2D pairing and FIGURE 2. The relations of content requester, content helper, resource
block and cache content can be formulated as a 4-uniform hypergraph.
channel allocation scheme.

2) CASE 2 (DISTRIBUTED CONTROL SCENARIO)

In this paper, we consider caching content, required con-
The device exchanges information with adjacent devices tent, resource block, and the physical distance of a device
to determine which adjacent device can provide help in pair jointly to maximize the sum-rate in D2D networks.
D2D network. Let ζrlbf be decision variables. If the helper l delivers con-
tent f to requester r by using resource block b, let ζrlbf =1.
B. PROBLEM FORMULATION Otherwise, ζrlbf =0. In this case, each resource block can only
In this section, we formulate the caching based optimal D2D be allocated to a pair of devices. A pair of devices can deliver
pairing problem with channel allocation to maximize the sum a content item in a transmission. Therefore, the sum-rate of
of achievable date rate in D2D network. We represent poten- caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation
tial combinations of the content requester, content helper, can be formulated as the following problem:
resource block, and content as set N . A potential combination X
(r, l, b, f ) means that requester r can receive content f from max ζrlbf · wr,l,b ;
helper l by using the resource block b. Thus, the set of all r∈M,l∈M,b∈B,f ∈F
potential combinations can be described as s.t. pr,l,b · qr,l,f = 1;
X X
N = {(r, l, b, f ), pr,l,b = 1, qr,l,f = 1}. (6) ζrtbf + ζtlbf ≤ 1, ∀t ∈ M;
r∈M,b∈B,f ∈F l∈M,b∈B,f ∈F
It means that the appropriate content, resource block, content X
ζrlbf ≤ 1, ∀b ∈ B;
helper and requester can be linked via D2D communica-
r∈M,l∈M,f ∈F
tions. These D2D links can construct a weighted 4-uniform X
hypergraph model among content requester, content helper, ζrlbf ≤ 1, ∀f ∈ F. (8)
resource block and content, as shown in Fig. 2. r∈M,l∈M,b∈B
The transmission rate of D2D links is a key issue to find
the optimal assignment scheme for the optimal D2D pairing III. HYPERGRAPH BASED CENTRALIZED
and caching with channel allocation. We define the sum-rate 4-DMWM APPROACH
as the sum of achievable date rate for all the D2D links. The In this section, 4-DMWM based the squareIMP algorithm and
sum-rate Srate is given by a greedy algorithm is proposed for the caching based optimal
X D2D pairing and channel allocation to maximize the sum-rate
Srate = wr,l,b , (7)
of D2D network.
(r,l,b)∈A

where wr,l,b is the channel capacity between requester r and
helper l by using the resource block b, and A is a set of
these elements (r, l, b) in D2D links. Therefore, we focus on
maximizing the sum-rate for the caching based optimal D2D
pairing with channel allocation.
A. HYPERGRAPH FORMULATION
A hypergraph can be expressed as HG = (V, E) where V is
the set of vertices and E is the set of hyperedges. A weighted
hypergraph means each hyperedge e ∈ E has a weight w(e).
A hyperedge can be represented as a nonempty subset of

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L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
the vertices. The number of vertices is the cardinality of the
hyperedge. If each hyperedge has the same cardinality n, the
hypergraph is n-uniform. Therefore, an ordinary graph is a
2-uniform hypergraph. It means each edge has a subset of two
vertices. Content requester, content helper, resource block
and content item of each D2D link can be represented as
4 vertices in a hyperedge. Each hyperedge has a weight that
indicate the channel capacity of the D2D link. Therefore, the
caching based optimal D2D pairing with channel allocation
problem can be formulated as a weighted 4-uniform hyper-
graph, as illustrated in Fig. 2.
A matching of an ordinary graph G is a subset of the edges
in G such that no edges of the matching are incident. It means
that each vertex is covered at most once in these matching
edges. Similarly, a hypergraph matching of a hypergraph HG
is a subset of the hyperedges in HG such that no hyper-
edges contain the same vertex. The cardinality of a matching
is the number of matching edges. If a matching has the
largest cardinality of all possible matching results, it is called
the maximum matching. The multi-dimensional maximum
weighted matching of a weighted hypergraph HG is a subset
of the matching hyperedges in HG. In this case, our target
is to solve the 4-dimensional maximum weighted matching
(4-DMWM) problem. Therefore, the caching based optimal
D2D pairing problem with channel allocation is to find the
4-DMWM solution in the weighted 4-uniform hypergraph.
B. CENTRALIZED 4-DMWM BASED D2D PAIRING
AND CHANNEL ALLOCATION ALGORITHM
In this paper, we formulate the 4-DMWM problem for the
caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation.
However, the 4-DMWM problem is a NP-hard problem.
Therefore, we propose a caching joint optimal D2D pairing
and channel allocation algorithm to maximize the sum-rate
with low-complexity.
The MIS problem of graph G is to find a maximum
collection of mutually non-adjacent vertices. Since the hyper-
graph matching is closely related to the MIS problem, the
4-DMWM problem based on the weighted 4-uniform hyper-
graph can be transformed into a MIS problem. First, we
create a graph G = (V 0 , E 0 ) where each vertex is a sub-
set of 4 vertices in a hyperedge and the edge E 0 captures
all intersections between the vertices V 0 . In our weighted
4-uniform hypergraph, the hyperedges of HG correspond to
the vertices of graph G. Therefore, each vertex of G has a
weight that indicate the channel capacity of the D2D link. We
define the maximum weighted matching set as A, where A is
the set of the (r, l, b, f ) combinations. The w-MIS is to find
an independent set A with maximum w(A). Therefore, the
hypergraph HG can be transformed into an ordinary weighted
graph G = (V 0 , E 0 , w). Each vertex of weighted graph G is an
element of potential combinations in Fig. 2. The edge of G
indicates non-empty set intersections between two vertices.
In the D2D network, each vertex represents a D2D link and
an edge means that two D2D links have one or more same
elements in the weighted 4-uniform hypergraph. In this case,
VOLUME 4, 2016
the 4-DMWM problem can be solved by finding a w-MIS
solution in graph G. The w-MIS problem of an ordinary
weighted graph G is NP-hard. Therefore, we need some
approximation algorithms to find the w-MIS result.
1) SquareIMP ALGORITHM
The squareIMP algorithm needs polynomial time to find an
independent set A, where there is a k-claw free graph.
A k-claw W is an induced subgraph that consists of a center
node and talons TW in an undirected graph. The center node
is connected to an independent set of k talons. A graph that is
k-claw free means it possesses no k-claws induced subgraph.
Set the center set of a claw W as ZW = W − TW [21]. In the
4-DMWM problem, the weighted graph G is a 5-claw free
graph. To realize the squareIMP algorithm, we search for each
claw in the 5-claw free graph to update A by improving w2 (A)
in Algorithm 2. We define
N (TW , A) = {u ∈ A : ∃v ∈ TW such that u, v ∈ Eor u = v}.
If the TW of a claw W can improve w2 (A), we update the set
A as follows.
A ←− A ∪ TW \ N (TW , A).
Therefore, the set A is the expected set of D2D links for the
w-MIS problem.
2) GREEDY ALGORITHM
The greedy algorithm is a simple algorithm to find an inde-
pendent set A. In the greedy algorithm, we search for all
vertices to choose the heaviest independent set of vertices in
the graph G, as shown in Algorithm 3.
The 4-DMWM is the subset of mutually disjoint hyper-
edges. The set A corresponds to a subset of hyperedges in
hypergraph. The maximum weighted independent set A is a
set of vertices in graph G. The index set of A can be expressed
as A = {1, . . . , A}. Each vertex a of A corresponds to a D2D
link for the caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel
allocation.
TABLE 1. Complexity of Algorithm
We compare the complexity of the optimal, squareIMP,
greedy and random algorithm, as shown in Table 1. The
squareIMP algorithm is more achievable than the exhausted
search with the complexity of O(n5 ). The greedy algorithm
and random algorithm are much easier to implement than the
other algorithms.
As shown in Algorithm 1, we maximize the sum-rate for
the caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allo-
cation in D2D network. In the D2D pairing and channel
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Algorithm 1 D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation Algorithm Algorithm 3 Greedy Algorithm
Input: M , B, F, α Input: graph G = (V 0 , E 0 , w)
Output: Srate Output: A
Construct HG = (V, E, w) with M , B, F A=∅
Map HG to graph G Vsort =sorted(V 0 , ’descend’)
if α = 1 then for v in Vsort do
A = msq (G) //Algorithm2 N (A, V) = {u ∈ V : ∃v ∈ A such that {u, v} ∈ E 0 or
else u = v}
if α = 0 then if N (A, v) = ∅ then
A = mgr (G) //Algorithm3 A←A∪v
end if end if
end if P end for
Srate (A) = (wi )
i∈A

sum-rate in distributed synchronous and asynchronous

Algorithm 2 SquareIMP Algorithm networks.
Input: graph G = (V 0 , E 0 , w)
Output: A A. BIPARTITE GRAPH FORMULATION
A=∅
A bipartite graph can be denoted as BG = (V1 , V2 , Eb ) where
while there exists claw W such that TW improves w2 (A)
V1 , V2 are two sets of vertices and Eb is the set of edges. The
do
bipartite graph is a graph whose vertices can be divided into
N (TW , A) = {u ∈ A : ∃v ∈ TW such that {u, v} ∈ E 0 or
two disjoint sets V1 and V2 such that each edge connects a
u = v}
vertex in V1 to one in V2 . Moreover, the bipartite graph does
for k = 1 : 4 do
not contain any odd-length cycles. A weighted bipartite graph
for k − claw in G do
is a graph that each edge eb ∈ Eb has a weight w(eb ).
Anew ← A − N (TW , A) ∪ TW
A matching of a bipartite graph is similar to that of an ordi-
if w2 (Anew ) > w2 (A) then
nary graph G. The maximum weighted matching of a bipartite
A = Anew
graph BG is a subset of the matching edges in BG that
end if
are mutually disjoint to maximize the weights of the edges.
end for
In this section, our goal is to solve the 4-DMWM problem in a
end for
distributed way. However, it is hard to realize. To simplify the
for v in G do
4-DMWM problem, we transform the weighted 4-uniform
Anew ← A − N (v, A) ∪ v
hypergraph into a weighted bipartite graph. As shown in
if w2 (Anew ) > w2 (A) then
Fig. 3, the weighted hypergraph HG can be converted to
A = Anew
a weighted bipartite graph BG. First, we create a weighted
end if
bipartite graph BG = (V1 , V2 , Eb , w) that each hyperedge of
end for
HG can be represented as 4 vertices of V1 and each vertex of
end while
HG can be represented as a vertex of V2 . The 4 vertices of V1
connect 4 vertices of V2 corresponding to the 4 vertices of
the hyperedge respectively. In our weighted bipartite graph,
allocation algorithm, hypergraph HG can be constructed after 4 edges corresponding to the same hyperedge have the same
given the parameters M , B, F according to the Section III. weight. Therefore, the hypergraph HG can be transformed
Then we map the hypergraph HG to a graph G. The w-MIS into a weighted bipartite graph BG.
of weighted graph G corresponds to the weighted 4-uniform In this paper, we find the maximum weighted match-
hypergraph matching result. Unfortunately, the w-MIS is ing result of the weighted bipartite graph to simplify the
NP-hard. Therefore, we choose the squareIMP algorithm or 4-DMWM problem. When the matching result of the
greedy algorithm in Algorithm 1 to find the w-MIS. α is the weighted bipartite graph contains 4 edges corresponding to
indicating index of algorithm. We set α = 1 when we choose a hyperedge, the hyperedge is a member of the maximum
the squareIMP algorithm and α = 0 for the greedy algorithm weighted matching set A. After that, the 4-DMWM problem
in Algorithm 1. At last, we get the 4-DMWM result for the can be solved by using a distributed maximum weighted
caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation. matching algorithm in bipartite graph. Usually, the distributed
maximum weighted matching is not fully equivalent with the
IV. DISTRIBUTED 4-DMWM APPROACH 4-DMWM problem. It will loss a small part of sum-rate in the
In this section, distributed caching algorithms are pro- 4-DMWM result, while it is a simple and practical method to
posed for the 4-DMWM problem to maximize the solve the distributed 4-DMWM problem.

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L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
FIGURE 3. The bipartite graph for the caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation in the distributed
synchronous algorithm.
B. BP BASED DISTRIBUTED SYNCHRONOUS ALGORITHM
In the centralized algorithm, the BS acts as a central controller
that has the network information, such as the resource allo-
cation, the connectivity, users’ preference content statistics,
and distributed caching content statistics, etc. To avoid heavy
overhead of global network information and maximize the
sum-rate of the D2D network, BP based distributed syn-
chronous algorithm for 4-DMWM problem is proposed by
transforming the hypergraph HG into a weighted bipartite
graph BG. In the BP based distributed synchronous algorithm,
the weighted matching can be formulated as follows.
X p(x) = 0 otherwise.
max we xe ;
e∈E
X
s.t. xe ≤ 1 for all i ∈ V,
e∈Ei
xe ∈ {0, 1} for all e ∈ E,
where Ei is the set of edges incident to vertex i in bipartite
graph. The linear programming relaxation can be realized
by replacing the constraint xe ∈ {0, 1} with the constraint
0 ≤ xe ≤ 1 for each e ∈ E in the matching problem [24].
BP is a method to estimate the marginal distributions
with respect to the variables. The method associates with a
bipartite graph BG called the factor graph. With this graph,
BP iteratively passes belief messages along the edges of
the graph that represent estimates of the marginal distribu-
tions with respect to the variables [30]. The Max-product
form of belief propagation allows us to find the most likely
state of a probability distribution [24]. The max-sum algo-
rithm is equivalent to the max-product algorithm, but work
in log space. Therefore, it can avoid potential underflow
problem. The max-sum algorithm works by iteratively pass-
ing messages between the variables and factors. In order to
apply max-sum algorithm, we formulate maximum weighted
matching on bipartite graph BG as a MAP estimation prob-
lem by constructing a suitable probability distribution. In
our max-sum algorithm based caching problem, set a binary
variable xe ∈ {0, 1} with each edge e ∈ E. The probability
VOLUME 4, 2016
distribution is considered as follows:
X X
p(x) ∝ ψi (xEi ) we xe , (10)
i∈V e∈E
which contains P a factor ψi (xEi ) for each vertex i ∈ V.
ψi (xEi ) = 1 if e∈E xe ≤ 1, and 0 otherwise. It is noted
that i is referred to both the vertices of BG and factors of p.
Moreover, e is referred to both the edges of BG and variables
of p. The factor ψi (xEi ) means that at most one edge incident
to vertex i can be assigned the value 1. If xe = 1, e. Therefore,
the edges {e | xe = 1} construct a matching in BG and
The max-sum algorithm passes messages between vari-
ables and the factors at each iteration t for the caching based
optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation. For the p in (10),
each variable is a member of exactly two factors. An estimate
(9) x̂ is the output of the MAP of p. (i, j) and e denotes the same
edge in this case. Set xeh1 , xeh2 , xeh3 , xeh4 as the 4 edges in
bipartite graph corresponding to a hyperedges of the hyper-
graph HG. Then we present the max-sum update equations
adapted for the p in (10). At last, BP based distributed caching
algorithm can find the matching result for the distributed
4-DMWM problem based on the weighted 4-uniform hyper-
graph, as shown in Algorithm 4.
The computational complexity is measured by the number
of calculations in the BP based distributed caching algorithm
with a graph of size n. Each vertex of bipartite graph BG
sends a vector of at most size n to each of the neighbor
vertices in the other partition in each iteration of the BP based
distributed synchronous algorithm. Each vertex has at most
n − 1 neighbors. Thus, total number of messages exchanged
in each iteration are O(n2 ). Each vertex performs O(n) basic
computational operations to compute each element in a mes-
sage vector of at most size n. That is, each vertex performs
O(n2 ) computational operations to compute a message vector
in each iteration. Since each vertex sends at most n message
vectors, the total cost is O(n3 ) per iteration for all vertices.
By sharing computing tasks, each device does fewer calcula-
tions when running the distributed algorithm.
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 L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation

Algorithm 4 BP based Distributed Caching Algorithm Algorithm 5 Distributed Asynchronous Algorithm

Input: hypergraph HG Input: M , B, F
Output: Srate Output: Srate
Map HG to BG Construct HG = (V, E, w) with M , B, F
t=0 Map HG to graph G
Set tmax as a sufficiently large constant A=∅
Set N as the number of vertices in BG x10 = x20 = · · · = xn0 = 0
Set N 0 as the number of hyperedges in HG t=0
mt+1 t+1 t t
e→i [0] = me→i [1] = mj→e [0] = mj→e [1] = 0, ∀i, j, //Asynchronous search of all vertices
while Not convergent and t ≤ tmax do for v in V 0 do
for i = 1 : N do u=v
for j = 1 : N do //Search for all neighbors of vertex v
mt+1 t
e→i [xe ] = xe we + mj→e [xP
e] for i in Vnei do
t+1
mi→e [xe ] = max{ψi (xEi ) mte0 →i [xe0 ]} if xit = 0 then
xEi \e e0 ∈Ei \e if wi > wu then
end for u=i
end for end if
end while end if
nte [xe ] = xe we + mti→e [xe ] + mtj→e [xe ] end for
if nte [1] > nte [0] then t =t +1
x̂et = 1 xut = 1
else A←A∪u
if nte [1] < nte [0] then end for
x̂et = 0
P
Srate (A) = (wi )
end if i∈A
end if
for j = 1 : N 0 do
if xej1 , xej2 , xej3 , xej4 = 1 then links in the distributed network. Therefore, we search for all
j∈A vertices of graph G asynchronously to find the independent
end if set of vertices. Moreover, the neighbors of each vertex can be
end for P represent as Vnei in Algorithm 5. After that we find a max-
Srate (A) = (wi ) imum weighted vertex among the vertex and its neighbors
i∈A
to add to set A. Each vertex is searched in a different time
slot. After the search, we get the set A to calculate the sum-
rate for the caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel
C. 4-DMWM BASED DISTRIBUTED allocation in D2D network.
ASYNCHRONOUS ALGORITHM The computational complexity of the distributed asyn-
In the distributed synchronous scenario, at each clock tick, chronous algorithm is measured by the number of calcula-
a central scheduler activates all the devices of the network tions in the distributed asynchronous algorithm. We compare
simultaneously and monitors the communications that take the weights of each vertex and its neighbors. Each vertex
place between these devices. The distributed asynchronous has at most n − 1 neighbors. Therefore, total number of
algorithm means there is no central scheduler and any device messages exchanged for all vertices are O(n2 ). Each ver-
can wake up randomly at any moment independently of the tex performs O(n) basic computational comparisons in the
other devices. This mode of operation brings clear advantages distributed asynchronous algorithm. It is observed that the
in terms of complexity and flexibility [31]. computational cost of the algorithm scales as O(n2 ). Since
In this subsection, the distributed asynchronous algorithm it is an asynchronous algorithm, the total time complexity is
is proposed for the caching based optimal D2D pairing and O(n3 ) for all vertices.
channel allocation to maximize the sum-rate in distributed
system, as shown in Algorithm 5. The users of distributed V. SIMULATION RESULTS
asynchronous network connect with their neighbors by jointly In this section, our simulation results demonstrate the per-
considering the content caching and channel allocation. Then formance of our proposed centralized and distributed algo-
these devices can be formed as D2D links. In the distributed rithms for caching based optimal D2D pairing and channel
asynchronous algorithm, we search for all D2D links in differ- allocation in D2D network. We set the circular cell as a radius
ent time slot. At first, we construct a hypergraph HG with the of 400 m [32]. All devices are moving around and randomly
parameters M , B, F. The hypergraph HG can be transformed distribute in the cell at a time period. A device pair delivers
into a graph G. The vertices of graph G correspond to the D2D the data file by using a resource block in D2D network.

9220 VOLUME 4, 2016

L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
The channel between two devices is independent Rayleigh
fading channel. In this paper, we consider the influence of
physical distance, resource block and content item during the
communication. We set the number of resource blocks and
content items as B and F, respectively. Suppose the transmis-
sion time of each resource block is 20ms. Our simulation has
the same result when we choose other parameters. In our sim-
ulation, we analyze different schemes for the caching based
optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation. The detailed
simulation parameters are presented in Table 2.
TABLE 2. Simulation Parameters
In one case, the BS has the network information and allo-
cates the resource block to the pair of devices. There are opti-
mal, squareIMP, greedy and random centralized algorithm
in our simulation. The optimal algorithm exhausts search
for all possible states for 4-DMWM problem in exponential
time. The detailed 4-DMWM based on greedy algorithm and
squareIMP algorithm is presented at Section III. We search all
the vertices randomly in the random algorithm. The sum-rate
can verify the efficiency of the caching approach. In Fig. 4, we
compare the performance of sum-rate among the algorithms
FIGURE 4. Sum-rate of different centralized algorithm in D2D network
with B=2, F=3.
VOLUME 4, 2016
with B = 2, F = 3. Observed from Fig. 4, the sum-rate
increases with the number of devices. It is clearly shown that
the 4-DMWM based squareIMP algorithm can achieve an
highly approximate performance compared with the optimal
approach. The optimal approach is NP-hard which is com-
putational prohibited. Therefore, squareIMP algorithm can
guarantee the performance of sum-rate with the complexity
of O(n5 ) in D2D network. Moreover, the result of greedy
based algorithm is slightly lower than that of squareIMP
based with a much lower computational complexity O(n2 ).
Besides, the matching result of greedy based algorithm is
better than that of random algorithm. Therefore, squareIMP
algorithm can achieve a higher rate requirements, while the
greedy algorithm is a practical method with stringent latency
requirement.
FIGURE 5. Sum-rate versus number of resource blocks in 4-DMWM based
greedy and squareIMP algorithm with F=3.
We plot in Fig. 5 the number of contents is 3. Then we
choose different number of resource blocks to observe the
variance of sum-rate for the caching based optimal D2D
pairing and channel allocation. It is observed that the sum-rate
increases with the number of resource blocks when we fix the
number of content items. It implies that we can increase the
number of resource blocks to improve the overall throughput.
Moreover, the result of greedy algorithm is still a little lower
than the squareIMP algorithm with a much lower complexity.
As shown in Fig. 6, the sum-rate increases with the number
of cached contents in D2D network when we set B = 2.
It means that the overall throughput can be increased when
we increase the number of total cached contents. Fig. 6 also
illustrates that the performance of sum-rate by using the
4-DMWM based squareIMP algorithm is better that that
of greedy algorithm. However, the computational complex-
ity of squareIMP algorithm is higher than that of greedy
algorithm.
In another case, each device does some calculations when
running the distributed algorithm with no the central con-
troller. There are synchronous and asynchronous distributed
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 L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
FIGURE 6. Sum-rate versus number of contents in 4-DMWM based greedy
and squareIMP algorithm with B=2.
FIGURE 7. Sum-rate of centralized and distributed algorithm with M=6,
B=3, F=4.
algorithms in distributed system. The detailed algorithms are
present at Section IV. The sum-rate of different algorithms
varies with the different cell sizes. In Fig. 7, we compare
the performance of sum-rate among the centralized and dis-
tributed algorithms with different cell sizes when we set
M = 6, B = 2, F = 3. Observed from Fig. 7, the sum-
rate decreases with the radius of the circular cell. Fig. 7 also
reveals that these centralized and distributed algorithms have
similar sum-rate when the radius is larger than a certain size.
We assume that the file size is 120 kbits. Given a larger size of
file, long transmission time is required to ensure the reliable
transmission.
Two different content caching schemes are used in these
algorithms, as shown in Fig. 8 and Fig. 9. We fix the buffer
size as 2 for each devices in the simulation of scheme 1.
However, in scheme 2, the same amount of contents are
cached in different numbers of devices. In this case, the
9222
FIGURE 8. Sum-rate of centralized and distributed algorithm by Content
Caching scheme 1 with B=3, F=4.
FIGURE 9. Sum-rate of centralized and distributed algorithm by Content
Caching scheme 2 with B=3, F=4.
number of resource blocks is 3 and there are 4 content items.
Each content is cached twice in the devices of the network
in scheme 2. The sum-rate also increases with the num-
ber of devices in different algorithms with different caching
schemes. The simulation result of both the synchronous and
asynchronous distributed algorithm are lower than that of
centralized 4-DMWM based algorithm. It is obvious that
the sum-rate of BP based distributed synchronous algorithm
is lower than the centralized greedy algorithm. However,
the complexity of distributed synchronous algorithm is only
O(n2 ) for each device in a iteration. Moreover, the sum-rate of
distributed asynchronous algorithm is close to the centralized
greedy algorithm and the computational complexity is only
O(n2 ) for each device. In our simulation, we consider the
channel estimation is perfect. The optimality of the pro-
posed algorithm relies on the assumption of perfect channel
estimation.
VOLUME 4, 2016
L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
VI. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, we studied the caching based optimal D2D
pairing and channel allocation problem. This joint opti-
mization problem is formulated as a weighted 4-uniform
hypergraph model, where the 4-DMWM is the optimal solu-
tion. However, the 4-DMWM problem is NP-hard. Under
the control of the BS, 4-DMWM based squareIMP and
greedy algorithm was proposed to approach the optimal
solution with low-complexity. The squareIMP algorithm
achieves a better performance approximate to the optimal
approach with the complexity of O(n5 ). The greedy algo-
rithm, however, is much more useful in practical caching
based D2D communications with stringent latency require-
ment. In the distributed system, we proposed algorithms
in the scenarios of synchronous and asynchronous, respec-
tively. The sum-rate of distributed asynchronous algorithm
is closer to the centralized greedy algorithm with the com-
plexity of O(n2 ) for each device. Moreover, the simula-
tion result of BP based distributed synchronous algorithm
is slightly lower than the centralized greedy algorithm in
the distributed synchronous system and the complexity is
O(n2 ) per iteration for each device. The distributed algorithms
have very low complexity in each devices. Therefore, the
algorithms of this paper can be used in different scenarios
to solve the optimal D2D pairing and channel allocation
problem.
Acknowledgment
Part of this work has been submitted to IEEE ICC 2017.
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 L. Miao et al.: 4-DMWM Approach for Caching-Based Optimal D2D Pairing and Channel Allocation
LU MIAO received the B.S. degree in communica-
tion engineering electronic engineering from Jilin
University, Changchun, China, in 2015. She is cur-
rently pursuing the master’s degree in electronic
engineering from Tsinghua University, Beijing,
China. Her research interests include D2D caching
and maximum weighted matching problem.
BO BAI (S’09–M’11) received the B.S. degree
(Hons.) from the Department of Communica-
tion Engineering, Xidian University, X’ian, China,
in 2004, and the Ph.D. degree from the Department
of Electronic Engineering, Tsinghua University,
in 2010, Beijing, China. From 2009 to 2012, he
was a Visiting Research Staff (a Research Assis-
tant from 2009 to 2010 and a Research Associate
from 2010 to 2012) with the Department of Elec-
tronic and Computer Engineering, The Hong Kong
University of Science and Technology. He is currently an Assistant Professor
with the Department of Electronic Engineering, Tsinghua University. He has
also obtained the support from Backbone Talents Supporting Project of
Tsinghua University. In 2015 and 2016, he visited the City University of
Hong Kong as a Senior Research Fellow. He received the Honor of Outstand-
ing Graduates of Shaanxi Province. He also received the Honor of Young
Academic Talent of Electronic Engineering in Tsinghua University.
He has authored over 60 papers in major IEEE journals and flagship
conferences. His research interests include hot topics in wireless communica-
tions and networking, fog/cloud-RAN, network big data, and random graph.
He is the IEEE ComSoc Member. He received the Student Travel Grant at
the IEEE Globecom09. He was also invited as the Young Scientist Speaker
at the IEEE TTM 2011. He was a recipient of the IEEE ICC 2016 Best Paper
Award. He served in the Wireless Communications Technical Committee and
the Signal Processing and Communications Electronics Technical Commit-
tee. He has served as a TPC Member of several IEEE ComSoc conferences,
such as ICC, Globecom, WCNC, VTC, ICCC, and ICCVE. He has also
served as a Reviewer for a number of major IEEE journals and conferences.
9224
WEI CHEN (S’05–M’07–SM’13) received the
B.S. degree (Hons.) in operations research and
the Ph.D. degree (Hons.) in electronic engineering
from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in 2002
and 2007, respectively. From 2005 to 2007, he was
a Visiting Research Staff with The Hong Kong
University of Science and Technology. Since 2007,
he has been with the Department of Electronic
Engineering, Tsinghua University, where he has
been prompted to Full Professor since 2012, as a
special case of early promotion. After the human resource reform in Tsinghua
University, he is elected as a Tenured Full Professor of the new research and
teaching track in 2015. He also serves as an University Council Member, the
Director of the Academic Degree Administration Office, Tsinghua Univer-
sity, and the Deputy Head of the EE Department.
He visited the University of Southampton, U.K., in 2010, Telecom
ParisTech, France, in 2014, and Princeton University, in 2015 and in 2016.
He was supported by the National 973 Youth Project, the NSFC Excellent
Young Investigator Project, the 10000-Talent Program, the New Century
Talent Program of the Ministry of Education, and the Beijing Nova Program.
He holds guest/chair professor positions of some Universities in China.
His research interests are in the areas of wireless communications and
information theory. He is a member of the Beijing Youth Federation. He
served as a Tutorial Co-Chair of the IEEE ICC 2013, a TPC Co-Chair of
the IEEE VTC 2011-Spring, and the Symposium Co-Chair of the IEEE ICC,
ICCC, CCNC, Chinacom, and WOCC. He serves as an Editor of the IEEE
TRANSACTIONS ON COMMUNICATIONS, the IEEE TRANSACTIONS EDUCATION, the
IEEE WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS LETTERS, the IET Communications, China
Communications, a Co-Chair of the Communications Theory Symposium in
the IEEE Globecom 2017, and a Vice Director of the Youth Committee of
the China Institute of Communications.
Dr. Chen was a recipient of the First Prize of the 14th Henry Fok
Ying-Tung Young Faculty Award, the Yi-Sheng Mao Beijing Youth Sci-
ence & Technology Award, the 2010 IEEE Comsoc Asia Pacific Board Best
Young Researcher Award, the 2009 IEEE Marconi Prize Paper Award, the
2015 CIE information theory new star award, the Best Paper Awards at the
IEEE ICC 2006, the IEEE IWCLD 2007, the IEEE SmartGirdComm 2012,
and the First Prize in the 7th Young Faculty Teaching Competition in Beijing.
He received the 2011 Tsinghua Raising Academic Star Award and the
2012 Tsinghua Teaching Excellence Award. He holds the honorary titles of
Beijing Outstanding Teacher and Beijing Outstanding Young Talent. He is
the Champion of the First National Young Faculty Teaching Competition,
and a winner of National May 1st Medal.
VOLUME 4, 2016