Effective Resource Allocation in 5G-Satellite Networks

This paper addresses the radio resource management of multicast transmissions in the emerging fifth generation satellite systems (5G-Satellite). A subgrouping approach is exploited to provide video streaming services to satellite users by splitting any multicast group into subgroups. This allows an effective exploitation of multi-user diversity according to the experienced channel conditions and the achievement of a high throughput level. The main drawback is the high computational cost usually related to the selection of the optimal subgroup configuration. In this paper we propose a low-complexity subgrouping algorithm that achieves performance close to optimum. Our solution is suitable for implementation in practical systems, such as Satellite-Long Term Evolution (S-LTE), since the computational cost does not depend on the multicast group size and the number of available resources. Through simulation campaigns conducted in different radio propagation and multicast group environments, the effectiveness of the proposed subgroup formation scheme is assessed.