Received July 12, 2017, accepted August 8, 2017, date of publication August 15, 2017, date of current version

September 6, 2017.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/ACCESS.2017.2739820

A Stochastic Optimization Framework for

Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation
in Licensed-Assisted Access Networks
YU GU, YUE WANG, AND QIMEI CUI, (Senior Member, IEEE)
National Engineering Laboratory for Mobile Network, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing 100876, China
Corresponding author: Qimei Cui (cuiqimei@bupt.edu.cn)
This work was supported in part by the National Nature Science Foundation of China Project under Grant 61471058, in part by the
Key National Science Foundation of China under Grant 61461136002, in part by the Funds for Creative Research Groups of China
under Grant 61421061, in part by the Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Science and Technology Cooperation Projects under
Grant 2016YFE0122900, and in part by the 111Project of China under Grant B16006.

ABSTRACT Licensed-assisted access (LAA) has been becoming a promising technology to the supplemen-
tary utilization of the unlicensed spectrum. However, due to the densification of small base stations (SBSs)
and the dynamic variation of the number of Wi-Fi nodes in the overlapping areas, the licensed channel
interference and the unlicensed channel collision could seriously influence the quality of service and the
energy consumption. In this paper, jointly considering time-variant multi-wireless-channel conditions and
random numbers of Wi-Fi nodes, we address an adaptive spectrum access and power allocation problem
that enables the minimization of the system power consumption under a certain queue stability constraint
in the LAA-enabled SBSs and Wi-Fi networks. The complex stochastic optimization problem has been
decomposed as a modified Hungarian algorithm and a difference of two convex algorithm in the framework
of Lyapunov optimization. We also characterize the performance bounds of the proposed algorithm with
a tradeoff of [O(1/V ), O(V )] between power consumption and delay theoretically. The numerical results
verify the tradeoff and show that our scheme can reduce the power consumption over the existing scheme
by up to 73.3% under the same traffic delay.

INDEX TERMS Adaptive spectrum access and power allocation, D.C. programming, Hungarian algorithm,
energy aware, LAA networks, LTE and WiFi coexistence, Lyapunov optimization, stochastic optimization,
unlicensed spectrum.

I. INTRODUCTION in 5.8 GHz, etc. An emerging technology to supplementary

In the recent years, the increasing prevalence of smart
handset device (e.g. mobiles, laptops) has triggered an
explosive growth of mobile data stemming. Forecasts from
Cisco show the traffic demand is expected 1000 times as
much traffic by 2020 [1]. To improve the system capacity,
a common trend has emerged with deploying additional
low power nodes (LPNs, such as smallcells, femtocells),
and improving the spectrum utilization (such as massive
multiple-input multiple-output). However, the scarcity of
spectrum is becoming the bottleneck to further boost the
capacity of wireless communications [2]. To fundamentally
break through this predicament, academia and industry paid
attention to more available spectrum opportunities, such as
industry, science and medicine (ISM) bands in 2.4 GHz, the
unlicensed national information infrastructure (U-NII) bands
utilization of the unlicensed spectrum, called licensed-
assisted access (LAA), has been launched into the standard-
ization by Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) [3].
However, the LAA technology is still in its infancy, and
there are a few critical challenges arising in network coex-
istence among different radio access technologies, spectrum
sharing and access [4]. The major challenge is how to guaran-
tee the fair and effective coexistence between LAA-enabled
small base stations (SBSs) and Wi-Fi. Then, future 5G sys-
tems will support a variety of applications with wide ranging
QoS requirements, including VoIP, Virtual Reality, multi-
media streaming, machine type communications, as well
as traditional web browsing and file transfer. The random
arrived traffic and the random access mechanism of LAA
become an obstacle to guarantee QoS. Furthermore, the new

2169-3536
2017 IEEE. Translations and content mining are permitted for academic research only.
16484 Personal use is also permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission. VOLUME 5, 2017
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation
LAA procedures may have impacts on energy consumption
of mobile devices due to the extra energy used for channel
detection and packet collision. Lastly, due to the time-variant
wireless channel conditions and the dynamic variation of the
number of Wi-Fi nodes (e.g. Wi-Fi stations, Wi-Fi APs) in
the overlapping areas, LAA-enabled SBSs need a dynamic
spectrum access mechanism to switch to an unlicensed chan-
nel with very low-level interference and leverage the traffic
between the licensed and unlicensed bands.
As for the coexistence of SBSs and Wi-Fi, two kinds of
specifications are proposed: frame-based mechanism (FBM)
where SBS is activated at periodic cycles on unlicensed band,
and load-based mechanism (LBM) where SBS competes for
the unlicensed channel using listen-before-talk (LBT) and
backoff procedure like Wi-Fi [3], [5]. References [6]–[8]
design coexistence mechanisms, such as an almost blank sub-
frame (ABS) scheme, an interference avoidance scheme [6],
and adaptive listen-before-talk (LBT) mechanism [6], [8].
To improve the system throughput, [9] proposes a Q-Learning
based dynamic duty cycle selection technique for configuring
LTE transmission gaps. Reference [10] proposes a coex-
istence scheme by allocating the almost blank sub-frames
to improve the Wi-Fi throughput per user up to 50 times.
In [11], a LBT-based MAC protocol is developed, where
the transmission durations of LAA devices are optimized
to maximize the system throughput. In [12], a comparison
study is conducted between the approaches using duty cycle
and LBT, and revealed the effectiveness of LBT in the case
of strong interference. The above works mainly focus on
the design of coexistence mechanisms or improving the sys-
tem throughput, without considering the QoS issue and the
dynamic varying of wireless environment.
A few number of works have studied on QoS or energy
efficiency (EE) requirements of SBS in the unlicensed band.
Reference [13] develops a power allocation algorithm to
obtain pareto optimal between minimization of interference
in the licensed band and collision in the unlicensed band by
the weighted Tchebycheff method, while satisfying the rate
requirements of users. Reference [14] first investigates joint
licensed and unlicensed resource allocations to maximize
the EE through Nash bargaining when LAA systems adopt
a FBM method. However, [6]–[17] focus on static network
models and do not fully consider time-varying environment.
Reference [18] designs an adaptive adjustment of backoff
window size of LAA with the aid of stochastic optimization.
Nevertheless, it only deals with one LAA-BS sharing the time
fraction on the unlicensed band with Wi-Fi.
And most of works ignore the delay impact of LAA
network. In a different yet relevant context, the Lyapunov
optimization techniques are applied to wireless networks
and are powerful for optimizing time average queuing net-
works and giving joint stability and performance optimiza-
tion [19]. Reference [20] develops a novel framework for
multi-radio access technology aggregation on the network
protocol layer. With the aid of Lyapunov optimization,
[21] and [22] study a delay-aware resource allocation of
VOLUME 5, 2017
the heterogeneous networks, including the cellular networks
and WiFi.
To the best of my knowledge, the extension of the
Lyapunov optimization framework to heterogeneous LAA
systems has yet not been thoroughly studied and has been
non-trivial, especially considering the multi-channel and
QoS. The co-channel interference from SBS to the other
SBSs and marcocell, and the effective coexistence between
SBSs and Wi-Fi need to be considered simultaneously. Intu-
itively, when more SBSs choose to access the licensed chan-
nels, the co-channel interference will be aggravated. When
SBSs want to occupy the unlicensed channels, it’s a must
to find a channel with very low-level interference in the
dynamic varying of wireless environment. Otherwise, it will
cause a significant degradation in the performance of Wi-Fi.
Therefore, our paper mainly investigates an energy-aware
adaptive spectrum access and power allocation problem in
coexistence of LAA-enabled SBSs and Wi-Fi networks, hing-
ing on dynamic network model that reflects real network
conditions. The main contributions of this paper are threefold.
• We develop a stochastic optimization framework for
adaptive spectrum access and power allocation that
enables the minimization of the system average power
consumption under a certain queue stability constraint
in the LAA-enabled SBSs and Wi-Fi networks, where
the time-variant multi-wireless-channel conditions and
random numbers of Wi-Fi nodes are jointly considered.
• In order to solve the stochastic optimization problem,
two-loop optimal schemes are designed. The local opti-
mal solution can be obtained based on a modified
Hungarian algorithm and the difference of two
convex (D.C.) programming in the framework of Lya-
punov optimization.
• The theoretical analysis and simulation results show
that tuning the control parameter V can quantitatively
achieve a tradeoff of [O(1/V ), O(V )] between power
consumption and delay. The proposed algorithm can
reduce the power consumption over the existing scheme
by up to 73.3% under the same traffic delay.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. In Section II,
we introduce the system model. In Section III, a stochastic
optimization framework is developed to minimize the system
average power consumption. In Section IV, based on the
Lyapunov optimization, an online energy-aware algorithm is
developed and the performance of the proposed algorithm is
also analyzed. Finally, the numerical results are presented in
Section V, and conclusions are given in Section VI.
II. SYSTEM MODEL
Consider the downlink of a two-tier wireless network in a
slotted system, indexed by t ∈ {0, 1, 2, ...}, in which K SBSs
share the licensed spectrum with one existing macrocell, and
contend the available unlicensed spectrum with Wi-Fi nodes
(i.e., Wi-Fi APs, Wi-Fi stations) by using LBT, as shown
in Fig. 1. Denote the set of BSs as K = {0, 1, 2, ..., K }.
Without loss of generality, the marcocell BS is indexed by
16485
 Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

A. TRANSMISSION RATE ON THE LICENSED BAND

The achievable transmission rate of user sk on the licensed
channel at SBS k at slot t, can be given by
(k,l,s ) (k,l,s ) (k,l,s )
!
X xc k (t)pc k (t)gc k (t)
Rc(k,sk )
(t) = Blog2 1 + ,
I (k,l,sk ) + σ 2
l∈L
(1)

where σ 2 is the additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN)

power and I (k,l,sk ) is the co-channel interference, as given by
X X (j,l,sj ) (j,l,s )
FIGURE 1. System model for SBSs and Wi-Fi coexistence.
I (k,l,sk ) = xc (t)pc j (t)gc(j,l,sk ) (t). (2)
j6=k sj ∈Sj
0 and SBSs by 1, 2, ..., K . We assume that there is one
licensed channel and the total bandwidth of the licensed In (2), since the number of users served by SBS j on the
P (j,l,sj )
channel is equally divided into L subcarriers. Due the 5GHz channel l can not be more than one, xc (t) ≤ 1
sj ∈Sj
unlicensed band contain more than 500 MHz radio spectrum, P (j,l,sj ) (j,l,sj )
the unlicensed spectrum is divided into F channels, and each is satisfied. Hence, xc (t)pc (t) can represent the
sj ∈Sj
unlicensed channel is equally divided into W subcarriers. Let (j,l,s )
L = {1, 2, ...L} and W = {1, 2, ...W } collect the indexes transmit power of j-th SBS to its certain user and gc k (t)
of the subcarriers of each licensed and unlicensed channel, represents the channel gain form the j-th SBS to sk -th user on
respectively. We denote the bandwidth of each subcarriers as unlicensed channel l at slot t.
B. Meanwhile, it is noteworthy that we need to guarantee the
In the overlapping areas, there are Nf (t) Wi-Fi nodes at rate of macrocell’s users by imposing a threshold on the cross-
t-th time slot, contending the f -th unlicensed channel with tier interference IM , which is given as follows
SBSs. With Nf (t) varying, the f -th unlicensed channel expe- X X (k,l,sj ) (k,l,s ) 0 ) (t) ≤ I ,
riences various collisions. Thus, when the f -th unlicensed xc (t)pc j (t)g(k,l,s
c M (3)
k6=0 sk ∈Sk
channel has a heavy congestion, the SBS on this channel
should adaptively switch to other channel. We denote the where s0 is the macrocell’s user on the channel l.
unlicensed channel occupation indicator variables as y(k,f ) (t).
The integer variable y(k,f ) (t) is one if the k-th SBS occupies B. TRANSMISSION RATE ON THE UNLICENSED BAND
the f -th unlicensed channel at slot t, otherwise y(k,f ) (t) = 0. To guarantee the coexistence with Wi-Fi systems, we assume
There are Sk cellular users in the k-th SBS, where that SBS adopts an exponential backoff scheme to access
Sk = {1, 2, ...Sk } collects the indexes of the users. Fur- the unlicensed channel, like Wi-Fi [3]. According to [18],
ther, data packets arrive randomly in every slot and are f
the SBS has a attempt transmission probability τS (t) and a
queued separately for transmission to each user. Let A(t) = f
collision probability pS (t) on the unlicensed channel f . All
{Ask (t), ∀sk ∈ Sk , ∀k ∈ K} be the traffic arrival amount at
the Wi-Fi nodes on the unlicensed channel f are assumed to
slot t, where Ask (t) is the new traffic arrival amount of user f
experience the same attempt transmission probability τU (t)
sk at slot t. Let Q(t) = {Qsk (t), ∀sk ∈ Sk , ∀k ∈ K} be the f
queue length vector at slot t, where Qsk (t) is the queue length and a collision probability pU (t) in the time slot. The attempt
f
of user sk at slot t. The queues Q(t) are assumed to be initially probability of Wi-Fi nodes for given collision probability pU
empty. is given by [23]
We denote the licensed and unlicensed subcarriers assign- f

f
KU −1
(k,l,s ) (k,f ,w,sk ) 1 + pU (t) + · · · + pU (t)
ment indicator variables as xc k (t) and xu (t), f
respectively. If y(k,f ) (t) = 1 and xu
(k,w,s k )
(t) = 1, the subcar- τU (t) =  KU −1 , (4)
f f
rier w of the unlicensed channel f could be assigned to user b0 + pU b1 + · · · + pU (t) bKU −1
(k,l,s )
sk . If xc k (t) = 1, the subcarrier l of the licensed channel
(k,l,s ) (k,l,s ) where bj is the mean backoff time of stage j and KU is the
could be assigned to user sk . Let pc k (t) and gc k (t) be
maximum number of retransmissions for Wi-Fi. The attempt
the transmit power and the channel gain form the k-th SBS to
probability of SBSs on unlicensed band is
sk -th user on licensed subcarriers l at slot t, respectively. Let
(k,f ,w,sk ) (k,f ,w,sk )  KS −1
pu (t) and gu (t) be the transmit power and the f f
1 + pS (t) + · · · + pS (t)
channel gain from the k-th SBS to sk -th user on unlicensed f
τS (t) =  KS −1 , (5)
subcarriers w of unlicensed channel f at slot t, respectively. f f
e0 + pS (t)e1 + · · · + pS (t) eKS −1
(k,l,s )
Denote y(t) = (y(k,f ) (t)), xc (t) = (xc k (t)), xu (t) =
(k,f ,w,sk )
(xu (t)), and x(t) = [xc (t), xu (t)]. Denote pc (t) = where ej is the mean backoff time of stage j and KS is the
(k,l,s ) (k,f ,w,sk )
(pc k (t)), pu (t) = (pu (t)), and p(t) = [pc (t), pu (t)]. maximum number of retransmissions for SBS.

16486 VOLUME 5, 2017

Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

With the slotted model for the backoff process and the The total transmit rate of SBSs is given by
decoupling assumption [23], the collision probabilities of X X
Rtot (t) = Rsk (t), (12)
SBSs and Wi-Fi nodes on the unlicensed channel w are
k∈K \{0} sk ∈Sk
expressed by respectively
 Nf (t)−1  Mf (t) And the transmit rate of the entire system is defined as
f f f
pU (t) = 1 − 1 − τU (t) 1 − τS (t) , (6) t−1
1X
f

f
Mf (t)−1 R̄tot = lim E{Rtot (τ )}. (13)
pS (t) = 1 − (1 − τf ,k (t))Nf (t) 1 − τS (t) , (7) t→∞ t
τ =0
where Mf (t) is the number
P of(k,f
SBSs accessing the unlicensed
D. POWER CONSUMPTION
channel f and Mf (t) = y ) (t).
k∈K The power consumption of SBSs is represented by
According to Brouwer’s fixed point theorem [23], there X  
exists a fixed point for the equations (4)-(7). We can obtain the PC tot (t) = PCstatic + PCc(k) (t) + PCu(k) (t) , (14)
attempt transmission probability and the collision probability k∈K\{0}
of SBS and Wi-Fi nodes, respectively. where PCstatic is the static power, consisting of baseband
Then, the successful transmission probability for the SBS signal processing and additional circuit blocks. And the trans-
on unlicensed channel f can be given by mission power consumption of SBS k on licensed band,
(k)
f

f
Mf (t)−1
f PCc (t), is given by
P(fsuc) (t) = τS (t) 1 − τS (t) (1 − τU (t))Nf (t) . (8) X X
PCc(k) (t) = ξc xc(k,l,sk ) (t)p(k,l,s
c
k ) (t), (15)
Since the time slot of one LTE frame (i.e., 10 ms) is much
l∈L sk ∈Sk
larger than the Wi-Fi time slot (in the order of µs), the time
fraction occupied by the SBS on unlicensed channel can be where ξc is a constant that accounts for the inefficiency of
(f ) (f )
represented by Psuc (t) [13]. It is noteworthy that Psuc (t) is the the power amplifiers on licensed band [22]. The transmission
function of Mf (t). power consumption of SBS k on the unlicensed channel,
(k)
Therefore, the achievable transmission rate for user sk at PCu (t), is given by
xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t)pu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t),
X X X
SBS k on the f -th unlicensed channel can be written as PCu(k) (t) = ξu y(k,f ) (t)
Ru(k,f ,sk ) (t) = y(k,f ) (t)Psuc
X
(f ) f ∈F w∈W sk ∈Sk
(t) Blog2
w∈W (16)
(k,f ,w,sk ) (k,f ,w,sk ) (k,f ,w,sk )
xu (t)pu (t)gu (t) where ξu is a constant that accounts for the inefficiency of the
× (1 + ),
(f )
Psuc (t)σ 2 power amplifiers on unlicensed band.
(9) Furthermore, we define the average power consumption as
(f ) t−1
where Psuc (t) is the time fraction occupied by SBSs on the 1X
(k,f ,w,sk ) (k,f ,w,sk ) PC tot = lim E{PCtot (τ )}, (17)
xu (t)pu (t) t→∞ t
f -th unlicensed channel and (w) implies the τ =0
Psuc (t)
actual signal power for user sk at SBS k on the w-th unli-
III. PROBLEM FORMULATION
censed subcarrier.
In this section, we process to a stochastic optimization
Meanwhile, we need to guarantee the fair coexistence with
problem to minimize the average power consumption of
Wi-Fi by imposing a threshold on the the collision probability
SBSs, by jointly optimizing the licensed and unlicensed
of Wi-Fi. It can be written as
channels assignment as well as power and subcarriers allo-
f f
pU (t) − pU (t)0 ≤ θ̄ , (10) cation. To guarantee all arrived data leaving the buffer in
f a finite time, we introduce a concept of queue stability.
where pU (t)0indicates the the collision probability of
To achieve energy-aware transmission, the system is inclined
Wi-Fi without the competition of SBSs and θ̄ is the collision
f to allocate more channels and power to the users that have bet-
probability increment tolerance factor. pU (t)0 can be obtained ter channel conditions. However, for the users that have worse
by the two-dimension Markov chain analysis [24]. Besides, channel conditions, the queue length is likely to increase
it implicitly shows we can dynamically control the number unboundedly, resulting in a large traffic delay. In fact, this
of LAA accessing the unlicensed channel to guarantee fair is an power-delay tradeoff issue.
coexistence with Wi-Fi. The data queue Qsk (t) is given by
C. TOTAL TRANSMISSION RATE OF SBSs Qsk (t + 1) = max[Qsk (t) − Rsk (t), 0] + Ask (t), (18)
According to (1) and (9), the achievable transmission data rate And, a queue Qsk (t) is strongly stable [25] if
for user sk at SBS k is given by
t−1
X
,sk ) 1 X 
Rsk (t) = R(k,sk ) (t) + R(k,f E{ Qsk (τ )} < ∞.

c u (t). (11) Q̄sk = lim (19)
t→∞ t
f ∈F τ =0

VOLUME 5, 2017 16487

 Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

As a result, the problem can be formulated as follows where Pmin , Pmax , Rmin , Rmax are some finite constants.
Define the Lyapunov function as [21]
P1 : minimize PC tot
x(t),p(t),y(t),{Mf } 1 X X
2
t−1 L (Q (t)) = Qsk (t) . (25)
1 X 2
E{Qsk (τ )} < ∞,
 
C1 : Q̄sk = lim s k∈K\{0} k
t
t→∞
τ =0 Then the one-slot conditional Lyapunov drift can be
xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t)pu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t)
X X X
(k,f )
C2 : y (t) expressed as
f ∈F w sk
XX 1 (Q (t)) = E {L (Q (t + 1)) − L (Q (t)) |Q(t)}. (26)
+ (k,l,sk )
xc (t)p(k,l,s
c
k ) (t) ≤ Ptotal ,
Xl sk Thus, the drift-plus-penalty expression of P1 is defined as
xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t)p(k,f ,w,sk )
XX
C3 : y(k,f ) (t) (t) ≤ Pu ,
w sk
u
V E (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) + 1 (Q(t)), (27)
f ∈F
X (k,l,sj ) (k,l,s )
C4 : xc (t)pc j (t)g(k,l,s
c
0 ) (t) ≤ IM , where V is a control parameter. The following lemma 1
k6=0 provides the upper bound of the drift-plus-penalty expression.
U (t) ≤ θ̄ ,
0
C5 : pw
U (t) − pX
w Lemma 1: Assume link condition is independent and iden-
C6 : Mf (t) = y(k,f ) (t), tically distributed (i.i.d) over slots. Under any power allo-
cation algorithm, all parameter V ≥ 0, and all possible
k∈K
queue length Q(t), the drift-plus-penalty satisfies the follow-
xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t) ≤
X X
C7 : xc(k,l,sk ) (t) ≤ 1, 1,
ing inequality:
sk sk
X
C8 : k,f
y ≤ 1, V E (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) + 1 (Q(t))
f ≤ C0 + VE (PCtot (t) |Q(t))
,w,sk )
C9 : pc(k,l,sk ) (t) ≥ 0, p(k,fu (t) ≥ 0, +
X X
Qsk (t) Ask (t) − Rsk (t) |Q(t) (28)


C10 : xc (k,l,sk )
(t) ∈ {0, 1}, xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t) ∈ {0, 1}, k∈K\{0} sk
C11 : yk,f ∈ {0, 1}. (20)
where C0 is a positive constant, satisfying for all t
(k,l,s ) (k,f ,w,sk ) (k,l,s ) (k,f ,w,sk )
where {pc k (t)}, {pu (t)}, {xc k (t)}, {xu (t)}, 1 X X  
{y(k,f ) (t)} and {Mf } are variables. C1 is the queue stability C0 ≥ E Ask (t)2 + Rsk (t)2 |Q(t) . (29)
2 s
constraint to guarantee all arrived data leaving the buffer in k∈K\{0} k

a finite time. C2 is the total transmission power constraint Proof: Squaring both side of (18) and exploiting the
on both the licensed and unlicensed bands, while C3 is inequality
the transmission power constraint on the unlicensed bands
due to the regulations [3]. C4 can restrict the interference {max [Q − R] + A}2 ≤ Q2 + R2 + A2 − 2Q (R − A), (30)
arising from SBSs. C5 can guarantee the fair coexistence with we can get
Wi-Fi. C6 can guarantee the number of SBSs on the unli- 2  2  2  2
Qsk (t + 1) ≤ Qsk (t) + Ask (t) + Rsk (t)

censed channel f . C7 and C10 guarantee that each subcarrier
of the SBS has been used at most by one user. C8 and C11 can − 2Qsk (t) Rsk (t) − Ask (t) . (31)


guarantee that each SBS must use at most by one unlicensed
channel. Summarizing over sk , we have
!
IV. AN ONLINE ENERGY-AWARE ALGORITHM VIA
Qsk (t + 1) − 2
Qsk (t) 2
P P P
LYAPUNOV OPTIMIZATION k∈K\{0} sk sk
We can exploit the drift-plus-penalty algorithm [21] to solve 2
the stochastic optimization problem P1. First, we introduce P P
Ask (t)2 + Rsk (t)2


some necessary but pratical boundedness assumptions to k∈K\{0} sk
derive the drift-plus-penalty expression of P1. We assume the ≤
following inequalities X X 2
Qsk (t) Rsk (t) − Ask (t)


n o − (32)
E Ask (t)2 ≤ ψ, k ∈ K\{0}, ∀sk , (21) k∈K\{0} sk
n o The left-hand-side of (32) equals to 1 (Q(t)). Lemma 1 is
E Rsk (t)2 ≤ ψ, k ∈ K\{0}, ∀sk , (22)
proven.
hold for some finite constant ψ. In addition, PCtot (t) and To push the objective P1 to its minimum, a proper
Rtot (t) are bounded respectively by power allocation algorithm is proposed to greedily mini-
mize the drift-plus-penalty expression of P1. As a result,
Pmin ≤ E {PCtot (t)} ≤ Pmax , (23) from the stochastic optimization theory, it is required to
Rmin ≤ E {Rtot (t)} ≤ Rmax , (24) minimize the upper bound in (28) subject to the same

16488 VOLUME 5, 2017

Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

constraints C2-C11 except the stability constraint C1. to the real channels. The SBSs that are assigned to the virtual
Therefore, the transformed problem P2 is given by channel need to be reassigned to real channels. If adding any
X X new SBS to the channel can’t improve the total value of this
P2 : minimize VPCtot (t) − Qsk (t) Rsk (t) channel or can’t guarantee the constraint C5, the channel will
k∈K \{0} sk ∈Sk
not be participated in the assignment and be viewed as a
s.t.C2 − C11. (33) saturated channel. Then we cut off the SBSs accessing the
Unfortunately, the optimization is mixed integer non-linear real channel and the saturated channels, and reformulate it
(f ) as a new assignment problem. Repeat the above operation
programming (MINLP). Particularly Psuc (t) is a implicit
function of Mf and highly non-convex. Meanwhile, the until there are no SBSs accessing the virtual channel or no
computational complexity of solving the problem increases unsaturated channels.
significantly as the number of users increases. To deal with In the Step B, it is noted that x is binary, we can recast these
the computational complexity of P2, we adopt an itera- constraints using the following inequality [26]
tive approach to find the unlicensed channel assignment, 0 ≤ p ≤ x3, (34)
and power and subcarriers allocation as the local optimal
solution of P2. Step A and B are iteratively executed until where 3 > 0 is a predefined constant. Using (34), we can
convergence. safely remove x from the objective function, C2-C4. This is
1) Step A: Unlicensed Channel Assignment. Given the because when x = 0, (34) can guarantee p = 0. We can
power and subcarriers allocation, the remaining vari- further transform the binary constraint C10 as the intersection
ables are {y(k,f ) (t)} and {Mf }. This is still NP-hard prob- of the following regions
lem, where the exhaustive search is applied to pick the
0 ≤ xc j ≤ 1, 0 ≤ xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ≤ 1,
(k,l,s )
optimal {y(k,f ) (t)} and {Mf }. However, the number of (35)
XXX 2
possible combinations for unlicensed channel assign- (xc(k,l,sk ) − (xc(k,l,sk ) ) )
ment (y(k,f ) ) is 2KF , and the computation complexity k l sk
could not be affordable for practical systems. Here, we 2
(xu(k,f ,w,sk ) − (xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ) ) ≤ 0. (36)
XXX
+
model the subproblem as the assignment problem and
k w sk
solve it by using a modified Hungarian algorithm.
2) Step B: Power and Subcarriers Allocation. Although Although optimization variables x are continuous values,
the remaining subproblem is also MINLP and non- constraint (36) is non-convex. In order to deal with (36),
convex, we can equivalently transform the problem to we reformulate P2, as given by (37) on the bottom of the
a D.C. programming as discussed in the sequel. next page, where λ acts a penalty factor. It is proven that for
In the following, the detailed techniques of Step A and B sufficiently large values of λ, P3 can be equivalent to P2 [26].
will be presented here. For convenience’s sake, we get rid of Define
the slot index t without ambiguity. f (P, x) = VPCtot −
XXX
Qs k
The Step A involves three cases as follows. In the case that k l sk
the number of SBSs is equal to the number of unlicensed !
X
channel × Blog2 p(k,l,sk ) g(k,l,sk ) +σ 2
c c
(K = F), it can be modeled as a standard matching problem. k
We view each SBS as a job that requires a unlicensed channel XXX
,sk )
XXX
− Qsk R(k,f
u +λ (xc(k,l,sk ) )
to transmit the traffic data, and each unlicensed channel
k f sk k l sk
as a machine. When SBS k is assigned to the unlicensed
(k,f ,s ) (xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ),
XXXX
channel f , it obtains a value 8, 8k,f = Qsk Ru k − +λ (38)
P
sk ∈Sk k f w sk
P P (k,f ,w,sk ) (k,f ,w,sk )
ξu xu pu . The solution of this case
 
w∈W sk ∈Sk
XXX X (j,l,sj )
g(P, x) = − Qsk Blog2  pc g(j,l,s k ) + σ 2
can be found using Hungarian algorithm. As the unlicensed c
k l sk j6=k
spectrum is bandwidth-rich, there is a common case that the XXX 2
number of SBSs is less than the number of unlicensed channel +λ (xc(k,l,sk ) )
(K < F). It can be transformed as a standard form, as F − K k l sk
virtual jobs are added and the values of these virtual jobs are 2
(xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ) .
XXXX
+λ (39)
zero.
k f w sk
Lastly, it is a relatively complex case that the number
of SBSs is large than the number of unlicensed channel Since f (P, x) and g(P, x) are convex, the objective func-
(K > F). It may incur that more than one SBS are assigned tion is the difference of two convex functions, as given by
to the same channel. To cope with this case, we also add f (P, x) − g(P, x). As a result, P3 is a D.C. programming.
K − F virtual machines and set the values to zero. Thus, Therefore, we can apply successive convex approximation to
through Hungarian algorithm, we can obtain the assignment obtain a local optimal solution of P3.

VOLUME 5, 2017 16489

 Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

Let i denote the iteration number. Since g(P, x) is convex,
at the i-th iteration, we have
f (p, x) − g (p, x)
≤ f (p, x) − g (p(i − 1), x(i − 1))
− ∇p g (p(i − 1), x(i − 1)) (p − p(i − 1))
− ∇x g (p(i − 1), x(i − 1)) (x − x(i − 1)),
where p(i − 1) and x(i − 1) are the solutions of the problem at
(i − 1)-th iteration, and ∇p and ∇x are the gradient operation
with respect to p and x. As a result, P3 becomes a convex
optimization problem, which can be efficiently solved by
using standard convex optimization techniques, such as the
interior-point method.
Our proposed algorithm can be explicitly described in
Algorithm 1 and Algorithm 2.
Algorithm 1 Step A Based on Modified Hungarian
Algorithm
1: Given p(0) and x(0), and the value 8k,f .
2: if K = F then
3: Utilize the Hungarian algorithm to find the optimal
assignment y and {Mf }.
4: else if K < F then
5: Add F − K virtual SBSs and set the values to be zero.
Then use the Hungarian algorithm to find the optimal
assignment.
6: else
7: Add K − F virtual channels and set the values to be
zero. Use the Hungarian algorithm to find and cut off
the SBSs accessing the real channels. Then, if adding
any virtual SBS to the channel can’t improve the total
value of this channel or can’t guarantee the constraint
C5, the channel will be cut off. Denote the number of
deleted channels as F1 .
8: K = K − F and F = F − F1 . Reformulate it as a new
assignment problem. Repeat the above operation until
there are no SBSs accessing the virtual channel or no
unsaturated channels.
9: end if
Algorithm 2 Step B of Solving P3 Based on D.C.
Programming
1: Initialize p(0) and x(0).
2: Acquire the current queue state Q and the channel state
(k,l,s ) (k,f ,w,sk )
gc k and gu .
3: repeat
4: Optimize P3 to obtain optimal p and x by using a D.C.
(40) program.
5: until convergence of p and x
A. COMPLEXITY ANALYSIS
In the case of K ≤ F, the complexity of unlicensed channel
assignment using the Hungarian algorithm is O(F 3 ). In the
case of K > F, the complexity of unlicensed channel assign-
ment is O( KF F 3 ) = O(K F 2 ). And, let I denote the maximum
number of cellular users in the SBS, i.e., I = max |Sk |. There
k∈K
are totally 2KLI + 2KFWI decision variables and 2KLI +
2KFWI + KL + KFW + 2K + 1 convex and linear constraints
in the P3. Thus, the complexity of the D.C. programm is
O((2KLI + 2KFWI )3 (2KLI + 2KFWI + KL + KFW + 2K +
1)), based on [26]. As a result, the total complexity of the
worst case is O(K F 2 (2KLI + 2KFWI )3 (2KLI + 2KFWI +
KL + KFW + 2K + 1)).
B. PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS
Since the system state per time slot is i.i.d., We can quantify
the performance of our proposed algorithm, by means of
Markovian randomness [21]. Denote PCtot ∗ (t), R∗ (t) as the
sk
optimal power consumption and the corresponding rate. If the
boundness assumptions (21)-(24) hold, there exists an i.i.d
spectrum access and power allocation algorithm, satisfying
E R∗sk (t) ≥ E Ask (t) + ε,



(41)
where ε is a small positive value. The following Theorem
reveals the performance bounds of average power and aver-
age delay of the proposed algorithm.
Theorem 1: Suppose the system state per slot time is i.i.d,
the average power and average queue length of the proposed

X X
P3 : minimize V PCtot − Qsk Rsk
x(t),p(t)
k∈K \{0} sk ∈Sk
2 2
(xu(k,f ,w,sk ) − (xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ) )
XXX XXX
+λ (xc(k,l,sk ) − (xc(k,l,sk ) ) ) + λ
k l sk k w sk

pu(k,f ,w,sk ) pu(k,f ,w,sk ) ≤ Pu

XXX XX XXX
s.t. + pc(k,l,sk ) ≤ Ptotal ,
f ∈F w sk l sk f ∈F w sk
,w,sk )
≤ xu(k,f ,w,sk ) (t)3, C7,
X (k,l,sj )
pc (t)gc(k,l,s0 ) (t) ≤ IM , p(k,l,s
c
k ) (t) ≤ x (k,l,sk ) (t)3,
c p(k,f
u (t)
k6=0
p(k,l,s
c
k ) ≥ 0, pu(k,f ,w,sk ) ≥ 0, xc(k,l,sk ) ∈ [0, 1], xu(k,f ,w,sk ) ∈ [0, 1]. (37)

16490 VOLUME 5, 2017

Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation

algorithm are bounded respectively by Theorem 1 implies a tradeoff of [O(1/V ), O(V )] between
C0 ∗
power consumption and queue length (i.e., delay). In other
+ PC tot ,
PC tot ≤ (42) word, by increasing control parameter V , the power consump-
V ∗
C0 + V PC tot tion can converge to the optimal value but the traffic delay
Q≤ , (43) gets increasing.
ε
where C0 and ε are defined in (29) and (45), respectively.
V. SIMULATION
Proof: Denote P∗tot (t), R∗sk (t) as the optimal power
In this section, we evaluate the performance of the pro-
allocation and the corresponding rate. Because the algorithm
posed algorithm in different scenarios. The simulation is
minimizes the right-hand-size of (28), we have
conducted with the time slot length being 10 ms, and run for
VE (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) + 1 (Q(t))
5000 slots. Assume that all the users, SBSs and Wi-Fi nodes
≤ C0 + VE PCtot ∗
(t) |Q(t) are uniformly distributed. The arrival data packet of each user
X follows Poisson distribution. The channel gains of licensed
Qsk (t) E Ask (t) − R∗sk (t) |Q(t)


+ (44)
sk
and unlicensed bands follow to the ITU-UMi. The system
parameters used in the paper are summarized in Table 1,
If the boundness assumption (21)-(24) holds, there exists an unless otherwise specified.
i.i.d power allocation algorithm P∗tot (t), satisfying
E R∗sk (t) ≥ E Ask (t) + ε



(45) TABLE 1. Simulation parameters.

Plugging (45) into (44), we have

VE (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) +
X 1 (Q(t))
≤B−ε Qsk (t) + VE PCtot
∗
(t) |Q(t) (46)


sk

To (46), using telescoping sums over t ∈ {0, 1, ..., K − 1}

k−1
1 (Q(t)) =E {L (Q (K ))} − E {L (Q (0))},
P
and exploiting
t=0
we can get
K
X −1
V E (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) + E {L (Q (K ))} − E {L (Q (0))}
t=0
∗
(t) |Q(t)


≤ KC0 + K VE PCtot (47)
Dividing (47) by KV and taking a limit as K → ∞, rearrang-
ing the term, we obtain
K −1
1 X C0
E (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) ≤ ∗
(t) |Q(t)


lim + E PCtot
K →∞ K V
t=0
(48)
Thus, PCtot ≤ CV0 + PCtot ∗ , Eq. (42) is proven.

Similarly, as to (46), using telescoping sums over

t ∈ {0, 1, ..., K − 1}, we have
K
X −1
V E (PCtot (t) |Q(t)) + E {L (Q (K ))} − E {L (Q (0))} A. CONVERGENCE PERFORMANCE
t=0 In this section, we investigate the convergence of the pro-
K −1 X
X posed algorithm. Algorithm 1 and Algorithm 2 are iteratively
∗
(t) |Q(t) −ε Qsk (t) (49)


≤ C0 K + VKE PCtot
executed, which can generate a sequence of the unlicensed
t=0 sk
channel assignment, and power and subcarriers allocation
Dividing (49) by εK and taking a limit as K → ∞, rearrang- vector solutions, as given by y[0] → x[0], p[0] → . . . →
ing the term, we obtain | {z }
Initialization
K −1 X y∗ [n] → x∗ [n], p∗ [n] → . . . y∗ → x∗ , p∗ . In Fig. 2, we plot
C0 V 1 X
∗
(t) |Q(t) − lim Qsk (t)

| {z } | {z }
0≤ + E PCtot
ε ε K →∞ K n - th loop Optimal solution
t=0 sk the convergence evolution of Algorithm 1. We set K = 8,
(50) L = W = 4, the total users
P
Sk = 20, the traffic load
∗
C0 +V PCtot k
Thus, Q ≤ ε , Eq. (43) is proven. λ = 1 packet/s and the control parameter V = 50. We assume

VOLUME 5, 2017 16491

 Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation
each user associates with the base station with the maximal
SINR. Obviously, for any loop, it descends for each iteration
and converges very fast. The gap between two successive loop
is also decreasing until convergence. As Fig. 2 shows, the
inner procedure converges at second iteration and the outer
procedure converges at fourth loop.
FIGURE 2. Convergence of Algorithm 1.
FIGURE 3. Convergence of Algorithm 2.
Furthermore, Fig. 3 displays the convergence of
Algorithm 2. We can also observe that for each loop, the D.C.
approximation results in a sequence of improved solutions
for the problem of P2. The proposed algorithm converges in
less than 8 iterations. And the outer procedure also converges
at fourth loop. As a result, the proposed algorithm has few
iterations to converge, as the Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 show.
B. OPTIMALITY TEST OF THE PROPOSED ALGORITHM
We evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm.
We compare the performance with two algorithms, exhaustive
search and random access. The exhaustive search can obtain
the optimum solution, but has high complexity. The random
16492
access approach could randomly assign the unlicensed chan-
nel to base stations and execute
P the algorithm 2. We set
K = 8, the total users Sk = 20, the traffic load
k
λ = 1 packet/s and the control parameter V = 50. As seen in
Fig. 4, the proposed algorithm can surpass the random access.
This is because the proposed algorithm can improve the
efficiency of unlicensed band based on the modified Hungar-
ian algorithm. And, the proposed algorithm can achieve the
comparable performance to the exhaustive search. As a result,
the proposed algorithm has lower computational complexity
and proximate optimality. In addition, it’s also observed that
as the number of subcarriers increases, the objective value of
P2 deceases, due to the increasing data rate.
FIGURE 4. The objective value of P2 for different algorithms.
C. QUANTITATIVE POWER-DELAY PERFORMANCE
In order to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed
algorithm in term of average power consumption and delay,
we compare the proposed algorithm with two different
approaches, the random access and power consumption min-
imization per slot (PCMPS). The PCMPS minimizes the
power consumption per slot, subject to C2-C10 and a new
rate constraint Rsk (t) ≥ Ask (t). The new constraint is added
to guarantee the QoS of P the users. We set K = 8, L =
W = 4, the total users Sk = 20, and the traffic load
k
λ = 1 packet/s. In Fig. 5, we plot the total power con-
sumption against V . It shows that when V increases, the total
power consumption of our proposed algorithm could decrease
and converge to a point at the speed of O(1/V ). According
to (42), the converged point is the optimal power consumption
∗
PC tot . Our proposed algorithm consumes less power than the
random access, because of improving the efficiency of the
unlicensed channels. And it is obviously observed that our
proposed algorithm consumes less power than the PCMPS,
when V ≥ 5. This is because PCMPS ignores the queue
states and always needs guarantee that the service rate is
greater than arrival rates. Fig. 6 shows the average traffic
VOLUME 5, 2017
Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation
FIGURE 5. Average power consumption versus control parameter V .
FIGURE 6. Average delay versus control parameter V .
delay against V . As V increases, the average traffic delay (or
queue backlog) grows linearly in O(V ), which is consistent
with (43).
Fig. 5 and Fig. 6 together show that we can achieve a
tradeoff between power and delay. For example, if the net-
work operator chooses 5 ≤ V ≤ 50, the proposed algorithm
outperforms the PCMPS and random access in both the power
and delay. In particular, the proposed algorithm can reduce
the power consumption over PCMPS scheme by up to 73.3%
under the same traffic delay. A balance between the licensed
channel interference and the unlicensed channel collision can
also be achieved by the proposed algorithm.
VI. CONCLUSION
In this paper, we have developed a stochastic optimization
framework for the coexistence of stochastic LAA-enabled
SBSs and Wi-Fi networks. A optimization problem is formu-
lated to minimize the system average power consumption by
jointly optimizing channel assignment, subcarrier assignment
and power allocation between the licensed and unlicensed
band. To solve the proposed non-convex and NP-hard opti-
mization problem, we adopt an iterative algorithm based on
VOLUME 5, 2017
the modified Hungarian algorithm and D.C. algorithm in
the framework of Lyapunov optimization. The theoretical
analysis and simulation results show that our proposed algo-
rithm can give a practical control and balance between power
consumption and delay.
REFERENCES
[1] ‘‘Global mobile data traffic forecast update, 2014–2019,’’ Cisco Visual
Networking Index, San Jose, CA, USA, Tech. Rep., Feb. 2015.
[2] R. Zhang, M. Wang, L. X. Cai, Z. Zheng, X. Shen, and L. L. Xie, ‘‘LTE-
unlicensed: The future of spectrum aggregation for cellular networks,’’
IEEE Wireless Commun., vol. 22, no. 3, pp. 150–159, Jun. 2015.
[3] Feasibility Study on Licensed-Assisted Access to Unlicensed Spectrum,
document TR 36.889 V13.0.0, 3GPP, Jun. 2015.
[4] G. Yu, G. Y. Li, L. C. Wang, A. Maaref, J. Lee, and D. Lopez-Perez, ‘‘Guest
editorial: LTE in unlicensed spectrum,’’ IEEE Wireless Commun., vol. 23,
no. 6, pp. 6–7, Dec. 2016.
[5] ‘‘Broadband radio access networks (BRAN); 5 GHz high performance
RLAN,’’ ETSI, Sophia Antipolis, France, Tech. Rep. EN 301 893, 2008.
[6] H. Zhang, X. Chu, W. Guo, and S. Wang, ‘‘Coexistence of Wi-Fi and
heterogeneous small cell networks sharing unlicensed spectrum,’’ IEEE
Commun. Mag., vol. 53, no. 3, pp. 158–164, Mar. 2015.
[7] A. Al-Dulaimi, S. Al-Rubaye, Q. Ni, and E. Sousa, ‘‘5G communications
race: Pursuit of more capacity triggers LTE in unlicensed band,’’ IEEE Veh.
Technol. Mag., vol. 10, no. 1, pp. 43–51, Mar. 2015.
[8] R. Ratasuk, N. Mangalvedhe, and A. Ghosh, ‘‘LTE in unlicensed
spectrum using licensed-assisted access,’’ in Proc. IEEE Globecom
Workshops (GC Wkshps), Dec. 2014, pp. 746–751.
[9] N. Rupasinghe and İ. Güvenç, ‘‘Reinforcement learning for licensed-
assisted access of LTE in the unlicensed spectrum,’’ in Proc. IEEE Wireless
Commun. Netw. Conf. (WCNC), Mar. 2015, pp. 1279–1284.
[10] E. Almeida et al., ‘‘Enabling LTE/WiFi coexistence by LTE blank sub-
frame allocation,’’ in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Commun. (ICC), Jun. 2013,
pp. 5083–5088.
[11] S. Han, Y. C. Liang, Q. Chen, and B. H. Soong, ‘‘Licensed-assisted access
for LTE in unlicensed spectrum: A MAC protocol design,’’ IEEE J. Sel.
Areas Commun., vol. 34, no. 10, pp. 2550–2561, Oct. 2016.
[12] A. M. Voicu, L. Simić, and M. Petrova, ‘‘Inter-technology coexis-
tence in a spectrum commons: A case study of Wi-Fi and LTE in the
5-GHz unlicensed band,’’ IEEE J. Sel. Areas Commun., vol. 34, no. 11,
pp. 3062–3077, Nov. 2016.
[13] R. Yin, G. Yu, A. Maaref, and G. Y. Li, ‘‘A framework for
co-channel interference and collision probability tradeoff in LTE licensed-
assisted access networks,’’ IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 15, no. 9,
pp. 6078–6090, Sep. 2016.
[14] Q. Chen, G. Yu, R. Yin, A. Maaref, G. Y. Li, and A. Huang, ‘‘Energy
efficiency optimization in licensed-assisted access,’’ IEEE J. Sel. Areas
Commun., vol. 34, no. 4, pp. 723–734, Apr. 2016.
[15] Y. Song, K. W. Sung, and Y. Han, ‘‘Coexistence of Wi-Fi and cellular with
listen-before-talk in unlicensed spectrum,’’ IEEE Commun. Lett., vol. 20,
no. 1, pp. 161–164, Jan. 2016.
[16] Y. Li, F. Baccelli, J. G. Andrews, T. D. Novlan, and J. Zhang, ‘‘Modeling
and analyzing the coexistence of licensed-assisted access LTE and Wi-Fi,’’
in Proc. IEEE Globecom Workshops (GC Wkshps), Dec. 2015, pp. 1–6.
[17] X. Wang, T. Q. S. Quek, M. Sheng, and J. Li, ‘‘Throughput and fairness
analysis of Wi-Fi and LTE-u in unlicensed band,’’ IEEE J. Sel. Areas
Commun., vol. 35, no. 1, pp. 63–78, Jan. 2016.
[18] R. Yin, G. Yu, A. Maaref, and G. Y. Li, ‘‘LBT-based adaptive channel
access for LTE-U systems,’’ IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 15,
no. 10, pp. 6585–6597, Oct. 2016.
[19] L. Tassiulas and A. Ephremides, ‘‘Stability properties of constrained
queueing systems and scheduling policies for maximum throughput in
multihop radio networks,’’ in Proc. 29th IEEE Conf. Decision Control,
vol. 4. Dec. 1990, pp. 2130–2132.
[20] T. Shuminoski and T. Janevski, ‘‘Lyapunov optimization framework for
5G mobile nodes with multi-homing,’’ IEEE Commun. Lett., vol. 20, no. 5,
pp. 1026–1029, May 2016.
[21] H. Yu, M. H. Cheung, L. Huang, and J. Huang, ‘‘Power-delay tradeoff with
predictive scheduling in integrated cellular and wi-fi networks,’’ IEEE J.
Sel. Areas Commun., vol. 34, no. 4, pp. 735–742, Apr. 2016.
16493
 Y. Gu et al.: Stochastic Optimization Framework for Adaptive Spectrum Access and Power Allocation
[22] Y. Li et al., ‘‘Energy-efficient transmission in heterogeneous wireless
networks: A delay-aware approach,’’ IEEE Trans. Veh. Technol., vol. 65,
no. 9, pp. 7488–7500, Sep. 2016.
[23] A. Kumar, E. Altman, D. Miorandi, and M. Goyal, ‘‘New insights from
a fixed-point analysis of single cell IEEE 802.11 WLANs,’’ IEEE/ACM
Trans. Netw., vol. 15, no. 3, pp. 588–601, Jun. 2007.
[24] G. Bianchi, ‘‘Performance analysis of the IEEE 802.11 distributed coordi-
nation function,’’ IEEE J. Sel. Areas Commun., vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 535–547,
Mar. 2000.
[25] M. J. Neely, Stochastic Network Optimization With Application to
Communication and Queueing Systems, vol. 3. Province, CA, USA:
Morgan & Claypool, 2010, ch. 1.
[26] E. Che, H. D. Tuan, and H. H. Nguyen, ‘‘Joint optimization of coopera-
tive beamforming and relay assignment in multi-user wireless relay net-
works,’’ IEEE Trans. Wireless Commun., vol. 13, no. 10, pp. 5481–5495,
Oct. 2014.
YU GU received the B.S. degree in communication
engineering from the Dalian University of Tech-
nology, Dalian, China, in 2014. He is currently
pursuing the Ph.D. degree in communications and
information systems with the Beijing University
of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing, China.
His main research interests include stochastic opti-
mization theory, machine learning, large-scale dis-
tributed systems, as well as their applications to
5G heterogeneous wireless networks.
16494
YUE WANG received the B.S. degree in commu-
nication engineering from Beijing Jiaotong Uni-
versity, Beijing, China, in 2014. She is currently
pursuing the Ph.D. degree in communications and
information systems with the Beijing University of
Posts and Telecommunications. Her research inter-
ests are in the area of wireless communications and
networks, with current emphasis on the analysis
and optimization of wireless caching technique for
5G and big data.
QIMEI CUI (M’09–SM’15) received the B.E.
and M.S. degrees in electronic engineering from
Hunan University, Changsha, China, in 2000 and
2003, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree in infor-
mation and communications engineering from the
Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunica-
tions (BUPT), Beijing, China, in 2006. She was
a Full Professor with the School of Information
and Communication Engineering, BUPT, in 2016.
She was a Guest Professor with the Department of
Electronic Engineering, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA,
in 2016. Her main research interests include spectral-efficiency or energy-
efficiency-based transmission theory and networking technology for 4G/5G
broadband wireless communications and green communications. She was a
Technical Program Committee Member of some international conferences,
such as the IEEE ICC, the IEEE WCNC, the IEEE PIMRC, the IEEE ICCC,
the IEEE WCSP 2013, and the IEEE ISCIT 2012. She was once awarded
the only Best Paper Award at the IEEE ISCIT 2012, the Best Paper Award
at the IEEE WCNC 2014, the Honorable Mention Demo Award at ACM
MobiCom 2009, and the Young Scientist Award at URSI GASS 2014. She
serves as a Guest Editor of EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications
and Networking.
VOLUME 5, 2017