Computers, Materials & Continua CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.

1571-1590, 2020

Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for

Downlink NOMA 5G Wireless Networks

Jianzhong Li1, Dexiang Mei1, Dong Deng1, Imran Khan 2 and Peerapong Uthansakul3, *

Abstract: Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is one of the key 5G technology

which can improve spectrum efficiency and increase the number of user connections by
utilizing the resources in a non-orthogonal manner. NOMA allows multiple terminals to
share the same resource unit at the same time. The receiver usually needs to configure
successive interference cancellation (SIC). The receiver eliminates co-channel
interference (CCI) between users and it can significantly improve the system throughput.
In order to meet the demands of users and improve fairness among them, this paper
proposes a new power allocation scheme. The objective is to maximize user fairness by
deploying the least fairness in multiplexed users. However, the objective function
obtained is non-convex which is converted into convex form by utilizing the optimal
Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) constraints. Simulation results show that the proposed
power allocation scheme gives better performance than the existing schemes which
indicates the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.

Keywords: 5G, NOMA, user fairness, resource optimization, multiple access scheme.

1 Introduction
The popularity of multimedia applications places higher demands on future wireless
networks. In addition, due to the rapid development of the Internet of Things, the number
of terminal devices has also increased rapidly, and will soon exceed the capacity of the
current system [Dai, Wang, Ding et al. (2018); Saraereh, Alsaraira, Khan et al. (2019);
Lee, Patil, Hunt et al. (2019); Jameel, Risaniemi, Khan et al. (2019); Saraereh, Alsaraira,
Khan et al. (2020)]. Therefore, the new generation of mobile communication systems (5G)
needs to further expand the system capacity to meet the emerging new business
[Alemaishat, Saraereh, Khan et al. (2019); Ding, Lei, George et al. (2017)].

1 School of Finance, Chongqing Technology and Business University, Chongqing, China.

2 Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Engineering and Technology, Peshawar, Pakistan.
3 School of Telecommunication Engineering, Suranaree University of Technology, Nakhon Ratchasima,

Thailand.
* Corresponding Author: Peerapong Uthansakul. Email: [email protected].

Received: 30 May 2020; Accepted: 19 June 2020.

CMC. doi:10.32604/cmc.2020.011822 www.techscience.com/journal/cmc

1572 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

In the face of increasingly tight spectrum resources, traditional multiple access

technology has got difficulties to meet the demand, and it is urgent to introduce a new
type of multiple access technology. Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) technology
not only supports large-scale user access but also greatly improves spectrum efficiency,
so it is considered as one of the key technologies of 5G [Alemaishat, Saraereh, Khan et al.
(2019); Kim, Park and Hong (2019); Liu, Qin, Elkashlan et al. (2017)]. In the face of the
needs of the new generation of wireless networks, traditional multiple access
technologies have got difficulties to meet, especially in terms of system throughput and
user rate experience [Bakht, Jameel, Ali et al. (2019); Jabeen, Ali, Khan et al. (2019);
Islam, Ayazov, Dobre et al. (2017)]. Therefore, the industry proposes to adopt a new type
of multiple access technology in 5G, namely nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA).
NOMA can improve system throughput and spectrum efficiency, and can also increase
the access of system equipment by multiple times. In some 5G scenarios, such as uplink
dense scenes and wide coverage multi-node access, power multiplexing is adopted. The
NOMA has obvious performance advantages over traditional orthogonal multiple access
and is more suitable for future system deployment.
Unlike traditional orthogonal multiple access transmission, NOMA introduces the power
domain multiplexing concept with the help of continuous interference cancellation
technology. Multiple users share the same resource block (such as the same frequency
resource), and at the transmitting end, due to the nonorthogonal multiple access mode, the
interference information is actively introduced [He, Xie, Xie et al. (2019)]. The user with
good channel conditions allocates less power, and the user with poor channel conditions
allocates larger power. Correct demodulation is achieved at the receiving end by successive
interference cancellation (SIC) technology. Receiver complexity is increased compared to
orthogonal transmission, but higher spectral efficiency can be achieved. The basic idea of
nonorthogonal transmission is to use complex receiver design in exchange for higher
spectral efficiency. With the enhancement of chip processing capability, the application of
nonorthogonal transmission technology in practical systems will become possible.
Many scholars have studied the problem of NOMA power allocation and ensuring the
fairness of cell edge users [Choi (2016); Cui, Ding and Fan (2016); Jiang, Tang, Gu et
al. (2020)]. Otao et al. [Otao, Kishiyama and Higuchi (2012)] introduces the performance
analysis of NOMA using the proportional fair method in resource allocation and introduces
three power allocation methods: Iterative water injection method, fixed power distribution
method, and fractional power distribution method. Seyama et al. [Seyama and Seki (2015)]
introduce the user set selection method based on the proportional fair scheduling strategy,
which can effectively reduce the computational complexity of user scheduling. Liu et al.
[Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015, 2016)] introduce a power allocation method based on
proportional fairness. The objective function makes the sum of the fairness factors of
multiple users the largest. Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] conducted a method study to
maximize the sum rate of two users under the condition that the total power is limited and
the minimum rate of each user is satisfied. However, Otao et al. [Otao, Kishiyama and
Higuchi (2012)] only considers the maximization of the proportional fairness factor and does
not involve the user’s Quality-of-Service (QoS) constraints; while Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1573

Petrova (2015, 2016)] considers the maximization of the proportional fairness factor and the
lowest data rate of the user when the channel condition of the cell edge user is very poor, the
overall performance and rate are not as good as the traditional orthogonal access technology
under the same conditions. Similarly, although Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)]
consider the user’s QoS and rate maximization, the fairness of the edge users is guaranteed,
but the system performance and rate are still lower than the traditional orthogonal access
technology under the same conditions. Zhu et al. [Zhu, Wang, Huang et al. (2017)] proposed
an optimal power allocation that has been characterized in closed or semi-closed forms and
explicitly considered the power order constraints in power allocation problems and
introduced the concept of the SIC-stability to avoid an equal power allocation on each
channel. It jointly optimizes the channel assignment and power allocation by exploiting the
matching algorithm along with the optimal power allocation. The algorithm has an impact
and improving the system performance. However, it requires more power consumption and
a large number of iterations to reach the optimal system performance. Timotheou et al.
[Timotheou and Krikidis (2015)] proposed an algorithm to maximize the fairness among
users in terms of data-rate under full CSI and outage probability under average CSI.
Although the resulting problems are nonconvex, simple low-complexity algorithms are
developed that provide the optimal solution. The results of fairness performance are
approximately an order of magnitude better than TDMA in the considered configurations.
However, it lacks to address the performance under SIC and unable to compare the
performance with other state-of-the-art schemes and also the performance is lower than
conventional OMA and OFDMA.
Therefore, the above research still cannot balance the relationship between user fairness
and system data rate. To address this problem, this paper proposes a new downlink
NOMA power allocation algorithm. NOMA adopts different power policies of different
users, which may lead to unbalanced user communication quality, unfair problems, and
affect service quality. This paper mainly studies the power allocation problem of
nonorthogonal multiple access based on QoS and proposes a power allocation algorithm.
The main goal is to multiplex multiple users in the same resource block on the downlink
to ensure the fairness of users, that is, quality of service (QoS). The idea of this paper is
to optimize the users with the worst proportional fairness while maximizing the overall
rate of all users. The data rate of the users multiplexed in the sub-band is not less than the
data rate of the orthogonal multiple access under the same constraint condition (the
lowest fair rate is traded off). The simulation shows that the performance of the proposed
method is better than the performance of Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] and
other existing schemes.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, the system model is described.
In Section 3, the proposed algorithms and their principle are analyzed. In Section 4, the
solution of the optimal distribution factor is described. Section 5 provides the simulation
results, while Section 6 concludes the paper.
1574 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

2 System model
In the downlink cellular system, as shown in Fig. 1, there is a base station with
𝑀𝑀antennas and single-antenna users. The system is divided into 𝑁𝑁SC sub-bands, the total
bandwidth is 𝑊𝑊𝑇𝑇 , and the bandwidth of each sub-band is 𝑊𝑊SC = 𝑊𝑊𝑇𝑇 ⁄𝑁𝑁SC . Assume that the
maximum number of multiplexed users is 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 in each sub-band and the base station
transmits information 𝑆𝑆𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 to the m-th user (m ∈ {1, 2, 3, ..., M}) of the n-th sub-band (n
∈ {1, 2, 3, ...,𝑁𝑁SC }). The term 𝑃𝑃𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 is the power of the m-th user (m ∈ {1, 2, 3, ..., M})
𝑁𝑁
in the n-th sub-band (n ∈ {1, 2, 3, ...,𝑁𝑁SC }), where ∑𝑗𝑗 SC ∑𝑀𝑀 𝑖𝑖=1 𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑗𝑗 = 𝑃𝑃𝑇𝑇 , and 𝑃𝑃𝑇𝑇 is the
total transmitted power. Then in the n-th sub-band, the signal received by the m-th user is
expressed as
𝑚𝑚 ∑
𝒚𝒚𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 = ∑𝑖𝑖=1
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 𝑖𝑖
�𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 𝒉𝒉𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 𝑺𝑺𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛
𝑚𝑚 ∑
= �𝑃𝑃𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 𝒉𝒉𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 𝑺𝑺𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 + ∑𝑖𝑖=1,𝑖𝑖≠𝑚𝑚
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 𝑖𝑖
�𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 𝒉𝒉𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 𝑺𝑺𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 (1)
where 𝒉𝒉𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 = 𝐠𝐠 𝐿𝐿,𝑛𝑛 𝑃𝑃𝐿𝐿 represents the channel parameter of the m-th user from the base
−1 (𝑑𝑑)

station to the n-th sub-band, assuming 𝐠𝐠 𝐿𝐿,𝑛𝑛 is the Rayleigh fading channel gain, 𝑃𝑃𝐿𝐿−1 (𝑑𝑑)
is the path loss, and 𝑑𝑑 is the distance between the base station to the user, 𝑵𝑵𝑖𝑖 represents
the additive white Gaussian noise. The symbol 𝒚𝒚𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 represents the reception information
of the m-th user, 𝑆𝑆𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 represents the transmitted signal of the m-th user of the n-th sub-
band whereas 𝑺𝑺𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 is the interfering signal from the i-th user of the n-th sub-band.

Figure 1: The system model of downlink NOMA

At the receiver, when the SIC technique is not used, the signal-to-interference-and-noise
ratio (SINR) at the receiver is as shown in Eq. (2).
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1575
2
SINR 𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �𝒉𝒉𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �
𝛾𝛾𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 = 2 𝑚𝑚 ∑
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 𝑃𝑃 +𝑊𝑊 𝑵𝑵
�𝒉𝒉𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 � ∑𝑖𝑖=1,𝑖𝑖≠𝑘𝑘 𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 SC 0
𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛
= 𝑚𝑚 ∑
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 𝑃𝑃 +1
(2)
𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 ∑𝑖𝑖=1,𝑖𝑖≠𝑘𝑘 𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛
2
�𝒉𝒉 �
where 𝑵𝑵0 represents the power spectral density of the noise, 𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 = 𝑊𝑊 𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛𝑵𝑵 represents the
SC 0
channel response normalized by noise (CRNN). According to Shannon’s equation, the
throughput in the n-th sub-band can be calculated as
𝑚𝑚 ∑ SINR
𝑹𝑹𝑛𝑛 = 𝑊𝑊SC ∑𝑖𝑖=1
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
log 2 �1 + 𝛾𝛾𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �
𝑚𝑚 ∑ 𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛
= 𝑊𝑊SC ∑𝑖𝑖=1
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
log 2 �1 +
𝑰𝑰𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 +1
� (3)
𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ∑
where 𝑰𝑰𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 = 𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 ∑𝑖𝑖=1,𝑖𝑖≠𝑘𝑘 𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 indicates that the user 𝑚𝑚𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 interferes with other users in the
n-th sub-band.
At the receiving end, SIC technology [Wang and Chen (2016); Zhu, Wang, Huang et al.
(2017); Timotheou and Krikidis (2015); Xia, Jiang and Wang (2019); Xia, Hu and Luo
(2017)] is used. As shown in Fig. 2, this paper assumes that there are two users in the cell,
𝑚𝑚1 and 𝑚𝑚2 , of which 𝑚𝑚1 has better channel conditions (internal cell users) and 𝑚𝑚2
channel conditions are poor (edge cell users). That is, the user with the worst channel
condition 𝑚𝑚2 directly demodulates its own signal, and filters the interference of the user
𝑚𝑚1 as noise. The user with good channel condition 𝑚𝑚1 performs SIC, first demodulates
the user 𝑚𝑚2 , subtracts the received signal from the received signal 𝑚𝑚2 , and then
demodulates the signal. It is worth mentioning that, the same method is used for 𝑀𝑀
number of users in the proposed study. That is if the user 𝑚𝑚𝑀𝑀−1 needs to be demodulated,
then user 𝑚𝑚𝑀𝑀 and the maximum number of multiplexed users is 𝑚𝑚max .
𝑦1 = 𝑃𝑃1,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆1,𝑛𝑛 ℎ1,𝑛𝑛 + 𝑃𝑃2,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆2,𝑛𝑛ℎ1,𝑛𝑛 +𝑁𝑁1 𝑆𝑆2,𝑛𝑛
Demodulate user 𝑚𝑚2

𝑃𝑃2,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆2,𝑛𝑛ℎ1,𝑛𝑛

𝑆𝑆1,𝑛𝑛
Demodulate user 𝑚𝑚1

𝑃𝑃1,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆1,𝑛𝑛 ℎ1,𝑛𝑛

𝑦2 = 𝑃𝑃2,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆2,𝑛𝑛 ℎ2,𝑛𝑛 + 𝑃𝑃1,𝑛𝑛 𝑆𝑆1,𝑛𝑛 ℎ2,𝑛𝑛 +𝑁𝑁2 𝑆𝑆2,𝑛𝑛

Demodulate user 𝑚𝑚2

Figure 2: Illustration of the demodulation process using the SIC technique for two users
1576 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

If more users are considered, assume that in the n-th channel, 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 users (𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ∈
{1,2,3,..., M}) are multiplexed, and these users are arranged in descending order of
CRNN, i.e., 𝝋𝝋1,𝑛𝑛 > 𝝋𝝋2,𝑛𝑛 >. . . > 𝝋𝝋𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 , after the SIC demodulation, the k-th user SINR is
expressed as
2
SINR 𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �𝒉𝒉𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �
𝛾𝛾�𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 = 2
�𝒉𝒉𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 � ∑𝑘𝑘−1
𝑖𝑖=1 𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 +𝑊𝑊SC 𝑵𝑵0
𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛
= (4)
𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 ∑𝑘𝑘−1
𝑖𝑖=1 𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 +1

Therefore, the throughput of the user 𝑚𝑚𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 is

SINR
𝑹𝑹𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 = 𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 + 𝛾𝛾�𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 �
𝑃𝑃𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛
= 𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 +
𝝋𝝋𝑘𝑘,𝑛𝑛 ∑𝑘𝑘−1
� (5)
𝑖𝑖=1 𝑃𝑃𝑖𝑖,𝑛𝑛 +1

The overall throughput of the system is

𝑁𝑁SC∑ 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ∑
𝑹𝑹 = ∑𝑗𝑗=1 ∑𝑖𝑖=1 𝑹𝑹𝑖𝑖,𝑗𝑗 (6)

3 Proportional fair power allocation

3.1 Generalized user minimum data rate constraints
Suppose there are two users in the n-th sub-band, 𝑚𝑚1,𝑛𝑛 (user 1) has better channel
conditions, 𝑚𝑚2,𝑛𝑛 (user 2) has poor channel conditions (cell edge users), i.e., 𝝋𝝋1,𝑛𝑛 >
𝑃𝑃
𝝋𝝋2,𝑛𝑛 , 𝑃𝑃SC = 𝑇𝑇 denotes the transmit power of each sub-band, assuming a power
𝑁𝑁 SC
distribution factor of 𝛼𝛼is assigned to 𝑚𝑚1,𝑛𝑛 , i.e., 𝑃𝑃1,𝑚𝑚 = 𝛼𝛼𝑃𝑃SC , then, 𝑃𝑃2,𝑚𝑚 = (1 − 𝛼𝛼)𝑃𝑃SC .
Considering the fact that the NOMA system should have a larger improvement in
spectrum efficiency and data rate than the OMA system, so it is assumed that the data
rates of 𝑚𝑚1,𝑛𝑛 and 𝑚𝑚2,𝑛𝑛 are not less than the data rate of OMA under the same condition
NOMA OMA
[Fang, Zhang, Chaeng (2016)], as shown in Fig. 3, that is, 𝑹𝑹1,𝑛𝑛 ≥ 𝑹𝑹1,𝑛𝑛 ; 𝑹𝑹NOMA
2,𝑛𝑛 ≥
OMA
𝑹𝑹2,𝑛𝑛 . It is also clear from the depiction of Fig. 3a that the NOMA scheme uses the same
sub-band but the users are allocated a different power whereas, in the OMA scheme in
Fig. 3b, the users are allocated a half-the-bandwidth but with full power which makes it
ineffective than the NOMA scheme.
𝑊𝑊𝑆𝐶 1 1
𝑊𝑊 𝑊𝑊
2 𝑆𝐶 2 𝑆𝐶

User 𝑚𝑚1

𝑃𝑃𝑆𝐶 User User

𝑃𝑃𝑆𝐶
𝑚𝑚1 𝑚𝑚2
User 𝑚𝑚2
⋯ ⋯ ⋯ ⋯

𝑛𝑛-th sub-band 𝑛𝑛-th sub-band

(a) (b)
Figure 3: Relationships under the same resource conditions of NOMA and OMA
schemes. (a) NOMA; (b) OMA
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1577

Mathematically, the relationship between the NOMA and OMA from Figs. 3(a) and 3(b)
can be expressed as
2 2
⎧𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 + 𝛼𝛼𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉1| � ≥ 1 𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 + 𝑃𝑃1SC |𝒉𝒉1| �
⎪ 𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC 2 𝑊𝑊 𝑵𝑵
2 SC 0
(7)
⎨ (1−𝛼𝛼)𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉2 |2 1 𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉2 |2
⎪𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 + 𝑵𝑵 𝑊𝑊 +𝛼𝛼𝑃𝑃 |𝒉𝒉 |2� ≥ 2 𝑊𝑊SC log 2 �1 + 1𝑊𝑊 𝑵𝑵 �
⎩ 0 SC SC 2 2 SC 0

To obtain the range of the power distribution factor 𝛼𝛼, we solve Eq. (1) in terms of Eq. (7)
and get the value range of 𝛼𝛼 as follows
�1+2𝜃𝜃1 −1 �1+2𝜃𝜃2 �1+𝜃𝜃2 −�1+2𝜃𝜃2 �
𝜃𝜃1
≤ 𝛼𝛼 ≤
𝜃𝜃2 (1+2𝜃𝜃2 )
(8)
𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉1 |2 𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉2 |2 �1+2𝜃𝜃2 �1+𝜃𝜃2 −�1+2𝜃𝜃2 � �1+2𝜃𝜃1 −1
where, 𝜃𝜃1 = 𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC 2
,𝜃𝜃 = 𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC
, assume 𝛼𝛼max = 𝜃𝜃2 (1+2𝜃𝜃2 )
, 𝛼𝛼min = 𝜃𝜃1
,
that is,𝛼𝛼min ≤ 𝛼𝛼 ≤ 𝛼𝛼max . According to the concept of NOMA, users with good channel
conditions allocate less power, and users with poor channel conditions allocate larger power.
1
Therefore, two 𝛼𝛼max < and 𝛼𝛼min ≤ 𝛼𝛼max conditions are met simultaneously.
2
The above is a constraint in the case of multiplexing two users in a sub-band. It is
assumed that 𝛼𝛼1 , 𝛼𝛼2 , . . . , 𝛼𝛼𝑘𝑘 , . . . , 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚 represent the power allocation factors of these m
users, respectively. The constraint is
𝑟𝑟1NOMA ≥ 𝑟𝑟1OMA , 𝑟𝑟2NOMA ≥ 𝑟𝑟2OMA , . . . , 𝑟𝑟𝑘𝑘NOMA ≥ 𝑟𝑟𝑘𝑘OMA , . . . , 𝑟𝑟𝑚𝑚NOMA ≥ 𝑟𝑟𝑚𝑚OMA (9)
The following constraints can be obtained by calculation using the methods of
Alemaishat et al. [Alemaishat, Saraereh, Khan et al. (2019); Ding, Lei, George et al.
(2017); Alemaishat, Saraereh, Khan et al. (2019); Kim, Park, Hong et al. (2019); Liu, Qin,
Elkashlan et al. (2017)].
 1

α ≥ (1 + mθ1 ) − 1
m

 1 θ1

  1

  (1 + mθ 2 ) m − 1 (1 + α1θ 2 )
α 2 ≥  
 θ2
 
 (10)
  1

  (1 + mθ k ) m − 1 (1 + (α1 + α 2 + ... + α k −1 ) θ k )
  
α k ≥
 θk
 

  1

  (1 + mθ m −1 ) m − 1 (1 + (α1 + α 2 + ... + α m −1 ) θ m −1 )
α m −1 ≥  
 θ m −1

 1

 θ m −  (1 + mθ m ) m − 1
  
α1 + α 2 + ... + α m −1 ≤ 1
 θ m (1 + mθ m ) m

𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉1 |2 𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉2 |2 𝑃𝑃SC |𝒉𝒉𝑚𝑚 |2

where 𝜃𝜃1 , 𝜃𝜃2 , . . . , 𝜃𝜃𝑚𝑚 represents ,
𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC 𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC
, . . . , 𝑵𝑵0 𝑊𝑊SC
, 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚 = 1 − (𝛼𝛼1 +
𝛼𝛼2 +. . . +𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚−1 ). According to the NOMA theory, it is also necessary to satisfy 𝛼𝛼1 <
1578 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

𝛼𝛼2 <. . . < 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚 . The solution of the power distribution coefficient that satisfies this
condition can be obtained according to the actual situation.

3.2 Proportional fairness power allocation algorithm

Proportional fairness [Choi (2016); Cui, Ding and Fan (2016); Otao, Kishiyama and
Higuchi (2012); Seyama and Seki (2015)] has been proven to maximize the logarithm of
user throughput and, therefore, to ensure user spectrum efficiency and user fairness. A lot
of references have adopted this method to allocate user power and user scheduling.
Proportional fairness takes into account instantaneous user data and average user data rate,
which is defined as follows
1 1
𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚 (𝑡𝑡 + 1) = �1 − � 𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚 (𝑡𝑡) + ∑𝑁𝑁 SC
𝑛𝑛=1 𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡)𝑅𝑅𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) (11)
𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐
𝑛𝑛 = 1,2, . . . , 𝑁𝑁SC ; 𝑚𝑚 = 1,2, . . . , 𝑀𝑀
where 𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚 (𝑡𝑡) represent the duration of time slot of the 𝑚𝑚-th user at 𝑡𝑡-th time slot, 𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 refers
to the average window length; 𝑅𝑅𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) means at the t-th frame time, instantaneous data rate
of the m-th user in the n-th sub-band;𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) represents the 0-1 sequence scheduled by the
user, if the user m is at the t-th frame time, the n-th sub-band is scheduled, then, 𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) =
1; otherwise, 𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) = 0.
The proportional fair scheduling strategy is to maximize the logarithm of the average data
rate over a period of time, which is equivalent to the geometric mean rate. To achieve this
goal, user scheduling and power allocation need to maximize the criteria of (12) as follows.
𝑁𝑁SC 𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡)𝑅𝑅𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡)
∏𝑀𝑀
𝑚𝑚=1 �1 + ∑𝑛𝑛=1 (𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 −1)𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚(𝑡𝑡)
� (12)
Eq. (12) clearly indicates that user fairness is increased by taking the geometric mean of
the average data rate of the users over a certain time frame. This obviously maximizes
fairness among users, where 𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 − 1 in Eq. (12) can be approximated as
1 𝑁𝑁SC 𝑀𝑀 𝑅𝑅𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛(𝑡𝑡)
�1 +
𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 −1
∑𝑛𝑛=1 ∑𝑚𝑚=1 𝑥𝑥𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) �
𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚(𝑡𝑡)
�� (13)
𝑅𝑅𝑚𝑚,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡)
It can be seen from Eq. (13) that 𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚 (𝑡𝑡)
is a factor of fairness selection and user fairness
is independent of the average window length 𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐 , which results in improved user fairness.
Although references [Choi (2016); Cui, Ding and Fan (2016); Otao, Kishiyama and
Higuchi (2012); Seyama and Seki (2015)] maximizes the sum of sub-band multiplexed
user fairness factors, it does not mostly consider the fairness of poor users. Therefore, this
paper proposes a new power allocation algorithm for this problem, that is, selecting the
user with poor fairness factor in the sub-band as the optimization target, so that the user
has the best fairness. Due to the guarantee of fairness, it is necessary to sacrifice the data
rate, which will inevitably reduce the fairness. In this paper, the OMA data rate under the
same conditions is introduced as the trade-off rate of the guaranteed NOMA system, that
is, the best user is guaranteed. Under the fairness condition, the user's data rate is also not
lower than the OMA data rate under the same conditions, achieving a trade-off between
fairness and data rate. In other words, the optimum user fairness is obtained by selecting
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1579

the maximum value of the average data rate over a certain time period of the users. The
analytical relation is expressed in Eq. (14).
𝑅𝑅1,𝑛𝑛(𝑡𝑡) 𝑅𝑅2,𝑛𝑛 (𝑡𝑡) 𝑅𝑅(𝑡𝑡)𝑀𝑀𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
argmax𝛼𝛼 �
𝑇𝑇1 (𝑡𝑡)
,
𝑇𝑇2 (𝑡𝑡)
,...,
𝑇𝑇(𝑡𝑡)𝑀𝑀𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
� (14)

The constraint in Eq. (14) gives a detailed explanation in Eq. (10).

4 The solution of optimal distribution factor

Suppose there are two users multiplexed in a sub-band by NOMA. For the sake of analysis,
the time t and sub-band n in Eq. (14) is omitted, and the optimization expression is
𝑅𝑅1 𝑅𝑅2
argmax𝛼𝛼 � , �
𝑇𝑇1 𝑇𝑇2
(15)
Subject to: αmax𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
Since Eq. (15) is nonconvex, since it requires supplementary elements such as the power
distribution factor value of each user, average data rate of each user and exact time
duration, so it is difficult to solve. Therefore, this paper considers an approximate method.
For a larger number 𝑋𝑋, satisfying 𝑋𝑋 > 0, the following approximation can be made.
𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖
− 𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 � 1 , 2 ,..., 𝑚𝑚 �
𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇1 𝑇𝑇2 𝑇𝑇𝑚𝑚 ≈ ∑𝑚𝑚
𝑖𝑖=1 𝑋𝑋
𝑇𝑇𝑖𝑖
(16)
−𝑘𝑘
Since 𝑋𝑋 is monotonically decreasing for k ≥ 0, the optimization method in Eq. (15) can
be equivalent to
𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅
− 1 − 2
argmin𝛼𝛼 �𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇1 + 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 � (17)
Subject to: αmax𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
The objective function of Eq. (17) can be further simplified as
𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅
− 1 − 2
𝑓𝑓(𝛼𝛼) = �𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇1 + 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 �

𝑊𝑊SC 𝑊𝑊SC 1+𝜃𝜃2

− 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙(1+𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 ) − 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙� �
= 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇1 + 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 1+𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2

= (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 )−𝑛𝑛1 + 𝑚𝑚(1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2 )𝑛𝑛2 (18)

𝑊𝑊
𝑊𝑊SC 𝑊𝑊SC − SC ln(1+𝜃𝜃2 )
where, 𝑋𝑋 > 0, 𝑛𝑛1 = 𝑇𝑇1
ln 𝑋𝑋, 𝑛𝑛2 =
𝑇𝑇2
ln 𝑋𝑋, 𝑚𝑚 = 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 .

Now take the second-order of the objective function 𝑓𝑓(𝛼𝛼), we get

𝑓𝑓 ′′ (𝛼𝛼) = 𝑛𝑛1 (𝑛𝑛1 + 1)(1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 )−𝑛𝑛1−2 + 𝑚𝑚(𝑛𝑛2 − 1)𝑛𝑛2 (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2 )−𝑛𝑛2−2 (19)
In solving the problem of Eq. (17), this paper uses the optimal Karush-Kuhn-Tucker
(KKT) condition [Fang, Zhang and Chaeng (2016); Benjebbour, Li and Saito (2013);
Saito, Benjebbour and Kishyama (2013); Al-Abbasi and Daniel (2015)] for solving the
inequality constraint. First, define the Lagrangian expression as
𝐿𝐿(𝛼𝛼, 𝜆𝜆) = 𝑓𝑓(𝛼𝛼) + 𝜆𝜆1 (𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 − 𝛼𝛼) + 𝜆𝜆2 (𝛼𝛼 − 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 )
𝑊𝑊SC 𝑊𝑊SC 1+𝜃𝜃2
− 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙(1+𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 ) − 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙� �
= 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇1 + 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 1+𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2
1580 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

�(1+2𝜃𝜃1 )−1 �(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�1+𝜃𝜃2 −�(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�

+𝜆𝜆1 �
𝜃𝜃1
− 𝛼𝛼� + 𝜆𝜆2 �𝛼𝛼 −
𝜃𝜃2 (1+2𝜃𝜃2 )
� (20)

The established KKT conditions are

𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕(𝛼𝛼, 𝜆𝜆) 𝑊𝑊SC 𝑊𝑊
− SC 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 𝑋𝑋−1
=� ln 𝑋𝑋� 𝜃𝜃1 (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 ) 𝑇𝑇1
𝜕𝜕𝜕𝜕 𝑇𝑇
𝑊𝑊SC 𝑊𝑊SC
𝑊𝑊SC − 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙(1+𝜃𝜃2 ) 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 𝑋𝑋−1
+�
𝑇𝑇2
ln 𝑋𝑋� 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 𝜃𝜃2 (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2 ) 𝑇𝑇2 − 𝜆𝜆1 + 𝜆𝜆2 = 0 (21)
𝜆𝜆1 ≥ 0, 𝜆𝜆2 ≥ 0 (22)
�(1+2𝜃𝜃1 )−1
𝜆𝜆1 �
𝜃𝜃1
− 𝛼𝛼� = 0 (23)
�(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�1+𝜃𝜃2 −�(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�
𝜆𝜆2 �𝛼𝛼 −
𝜃𝜃2 (1+2𝜃𝜃2 )
�=0 (24)

�(1+2𝜃𝜃1 )−1 �(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�1+𝜃𝜃2 −�(1+2𝜃𝜃2 )�

𝜃𝜃1
≤ 𝛼𝛼 ≤
𝜃𝜃2 (1+2𝜃𝜃2 )
(25)
For the above KKT constraints, the following four conditions are discussed.
1) When 𝜆𝜆1 > 0, 𝜆𝜆2 > 0, Eqs. (22) and (23) hold simultaneously, that is, 𝛼𝛼 is equal to the
lower bound and the upper bound at the same time. This situation does not hold in reality;
therefore, this condition is excluded.
2) When 𝜆𝜆1 > 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0 , at this time, according to Eqs. (21) and (23), 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ,
since𝜆𝜆1 > 0, is satisfied, therefore, in Eq. (21) when 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼 ∗ ) > 0 , i.e., 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ) > 0 , the
optimal value 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 can be obtained. It can also be explained by a one-dimensional
continuous function derivative: Since the second-order derivative 𝑓𝑓 ′′ (𝛼𝛼) > 0 of the
objective function 𝑓𝑓(𝛼𝛼) is constant, then 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼) is a monotonically increasing function.
According to the analysis condition, when λ1 > 0, 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ) > 0, indicating that 𝑓𝑓 ′′ (𝛼𝛼) > 0,
then 𝑓𝑓(𝛼𝛼) is a monotonically increasing function,𝑓𝑓 (the minimum value of 𝛼𝛼) is obtained
at 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 , so the optimal value of the objective function at 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ) > 0 is at 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 .
3) When 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 > 0, , according to Eq. (24), 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 , when the 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 is substituted
into Eq. (21), the solution is 𝜆𝜆2 < 0, which contradicts the hypothesis, therefore, ignore
this optimal value.
𝑊𝑊SC
𝑊𝑊SC − ln 𝑋𝑋−1
4) When 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0, solving Eq. (21), �
𝑇𝑇
ln 𝑋𝑋� 𝜃𝜃1 (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃1 ) 𝑇𝑇1 +
𝑊𝑊 𝑊𝑊SC
𝑊𝑊SC − SC ln(1+𝜃𝜃2 ) ln 𝑋𝑋−1
� ln 𝑋𝑋� 𝑋𝑋 𝑇𝑇2 𝜃𝜃2 (1 + 𝛼𝛼𝜃𝜃2 ) 𝑇𝑇2 = 0 , the solution of the equation can be
𝑇𝑇2
solved by MATLAB software, assuming the solution at this time for 𝛼𝛼opt , since it is true
by calculating 𝑓𝑓 ′ (𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 ) > 0 , only the relationship between 𝛼𝛼opt and 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 needs to be
considered. If 𝛼𝛼opt > 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 , then 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼opt ; if 𝛼𝛼opt ≤ 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 , then 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 .

5 Simulation results and performance analysis

In this paper, the proposed power allocation algorithm is tested and simulated by
MATLAB software. The channel condition is selected by the Rayleigh fading channel.
The base station coverage is within 500 m, and the user is 50 m away from the base
station. Considering the performance conditions of the receiver, between the two users
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1581

with a distance of at least 40 m, this simulation compares the two user data rates in one of
the sub-bands of the base station. 𝑁𝑁0 = −174 dBm, WSC =12Mbit/s, in order to compare
the results of the simulation, this paper defines the fairness criterion of the user with the
worst channel condition, that is, the data rate of the edge user accounts for the percentage
of the system rate.
Fairness of users with the worst channel conditions
The data rate of the user with the worst channel conditions
=
System rate
In Condition 2 of Section 4, KKT conditional analysis, i.e., when 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 (both users
are within 200 m from the base station), the NOMA and OMA data rates as shown in Fig. 4
and Fig. 5 are obtained. Comparing from Fig. 4, it can be seen that the rate of NOMA User
1 is just the rate of OMA under the same conditions. At this time, the rate of NOMA User 2
is greatly improved compared with OMA, indicating that NOMA can well overcome the
cell problem of poor quality of edge users. When User 2 is not at the cell edge, the
proposed algorithm is also compared with Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)]
algorithm (the method for 𝑚𝑚2 fairness of users with poor channel conditions: User 1 with
better channel conditions). Since the rate of User 1 in Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova
(2015)] is set by itself, the proposed study sets this value to be not less than the rate of
OMA under the same conditions. In Fig. 5, the proposed algorithm achieves a better sum
rate as compared with OMA and Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)]. Moreover, the
rate of the edge user is much larger obtained by the proposed algorithm than the result in
Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)]. At the same time, this paper averages the fairness
of the users with the worst channel conditions at different transmit powers. The fairness of
users with the worst channel conditions using the proposed scheme is 45.39%, and the
fairness of users in Choi [Choi (2016)] is 37.11%. Therefore, it is proved that the proposed
algorithm is superior to Choi [Choi (2016)] algorithm in fairness.
In Condition 4 of the analysis under KKT conditions in Section 4, when the two user
channel conditions are very different (such as one close to the base station and the other at
the cell edge). At this time, for each transmits power 𝑃𝑃, 𝛼𝛼opt solved by MATLAB is always
in the range of [𝛼𝛼min ≤ 𝛼𝛼 ≤ 𝛼𝛼max ], that is, 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼opt . As can be seen from Fig. 6, the rate
increase of NOMA User 1 is relatively slow, and the growth rate of NOMA User 2 is
relatively large. This is because the value of 𝛼𝛼opt decreases as the power increases,
resulting in User 1 has a slower growth rate, while User 2 has a power allocation factor of
1 − 𝛼𝛼opt , so User 2 is growing faster than User 1. Compared with the data obtained in Liu
et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)], it is found that when User 2 is at the cell edge, the
sum rate of the system is lower than that in condition 1, because the User 𝑚𝑚2 is closer to
the cell edge. The channel conditions are poor, so the rate of NOMA User 2, the rate of
OMA User 2, and the rate of Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] User 2 are both
reduced. Compared with Fig. 4, the proposed NOMA power allocation algorithm
increases the User 1 data rate, but the User 𝑚𝑚2 (cell edge user) and the system's sum-rate
decreases, that is, the fairness is relatively reduced, but the OMA user rate of 𝑚𝑚2 (cell
edge users) is also greatly reduced, so that the constraints of this paper (the rate of
1582 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

NOMA User 2 is not less than the rate of OMA User 2) are still satisfied, thus verifying
the correctness of the results. In Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] algorithm, due
to the limitation of the User 𝑚𝑚1 rate, although the edge user has a large transmission
power, the data rate is not improved due to poor channel conditions and large loss. It can
be seen visually from Fig. 6 that the data rate of edge users in using the proposed scheme
is always higher than the data rate in Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)].
7
10
12

11

10
Single User Data Rate (bit/s)

4
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

NOMA User 1
NOMA User 2
OMA User 1
OMA User 2
Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 1
Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 2

Figure 4: Comparison of the single user data rates of the algorithms at different transmit
powers when 𝜆𝜆1 > 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0
8
10
2.1

1.9
Sum data rate of two users (bit/s)

1.8

1.7

1.6

1.5

1.4
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

NOMA User 1 and User 2

OMA User 1 and User 2
Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 1 and User 2

Figure 5: Comparison of the sum data rates of the two users of the algorithms at different
transmit powers when 𝜆𝜆1 > 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1583
7
10
12

10

Single user data rate (bit/s)

8

2
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

NOMA User 1
NOMA User 2
OMA User 1
OMA User 2
Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 1
Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 2

Figure 6: Comparison of the single user data rates of algorithms at different transmit
powers when 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0, 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼opt

In Fig. 7, the difference between the sum rates of the two is not large. At the same time, the
fairness of the user with the worst channel conditions at different transmit powers is
averaged. The fairness of the user with the worst channel conditions is 26.76% in Liu et al.
[Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] and the worst user fairness of channel conditions is 29.27%
by the proposed algorithm, which confirms that the proposed algorithm is superior to the
method of Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] in fairness.
8
10
1.9
NOMA User 1 and User 2

1.8 OMA User 1 and User 2

Wang et al. [Wang and Chen (2016)] User 1 and User 2

1.7

1.6
Sum data rate of two users (bit/s)

1.5

1.4

1.3

1.2

1.1

1
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

Figure 7: Relationship between the sum data rate of two users of algorithms under
different transmit powers when 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0, and 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼opt
1584 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

In Condition 4 of KKT analysis, there is another case. When the difference between
channel conditions of the two users is small, the 𝛼𝛼opt value may decrease 𝛼𝛼opt < 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 as
the transmission power increases. In this case, the optimal value is 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚 . The simulation
results are shown in Fig. 8 when the transmit power is greater than 44 dBm, it is the same
as in Condition 2 in the KKT condition analysis. Compared with Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and
Petrova (2015)], it can be seen from Fig. 8 that the data rate of User 2 of the proposed
algorithm is greater than the rate of User 2 in Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)]. At
the same time, the fairness of the user with the worst channel conditions at different
transmit powers is averaged. The fairness of the users with the worst channel conditions
of the proposed algorithm is 35.86%, and the fairness of users with the worst channel
conditions in Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] is 27.59%, which confirms that the
proposed algorithm is superior to Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] in fairness. Fig.
9 compares the data rate of two users against different values of transmit power. As can
be seen from Fig. 9, the data rate performance of the proposed algorithm is better than
OMA and Liu et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] algorithm for each value of transmit
power which makes it clear that the proposed algorithm has better performance.
7
10
12

10
Single user data rate (bit/s)

2
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

NOMA User 1
NOMA User 2
OMA User 1
OMA User 2
Reference [Otao et al (2012)] User 1
Reference [Otao et al (2012)] User 2

Figure 8: Relationship between single-user data rates of algorithms under different

transmit powers when 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0, and 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1585
8
10
1.8

1.7

1.6

Sum data rate of two users (bit/s)

1.5

1.4

1.3

1.2

NOMA User 1 and User 2

1.1 OMA User 1 and User 2
Reference [Wang et al. (2016)] User 1 and User 2

1
0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Transmit Power P (dBm)

Figure 9: Comparison of the sum data rate of algorithms for two users against different
values of transmit power when 𝜆𝜆1 = 0, 𝜆𝜆2 = 0, and 𝛼𝛼 ∗ = 𝛼𝛼𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚𝑚
7
10
11

10

9
Single user data rate (bit/s)

7
OMA User 1
NOMA User 1
NOMA User 2
6 OMA User 2
Reference [Otao et al. (2012)] User 2
Reference [Otao et al. (2012)] User 1

5
50 100 150 200 250 300

Distance between two users d (m)

Figure 10: Comparison of the single user data rates of algorithms under the distance
between the two users
For the relationship between the distance between the two users and the data rate, it is
assumed that the position of User 1 is unchanged, and the position of User 2 is changed.
As the distance increases, User 2 is getting closer to the edge of the cell, so as to ensure
the value of User 1 in the reference is set to be the same as the data in this paper. As can
be seen from Fig. 10 and Fig. 11, the rate is declining, and the decline of the data rate of
NOMA User 2 is slower than that of OMA User 2. It can be seen from Fig. 10 that the
rate of User 2 calculated by the proposed algorithm is larger than the rate of User 2 in Liu
1586 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

et al. [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)], which proves once again that the proposed
algorithm is superior to the reference [Liu, Onen and Petrova (2015)] algorithm in the
fairness of users.
8
10
2.1

1.9
Sum data rate of two users (bit/s)

1.8

1.7

1.6 NOMA User 1 and User 2

OMA User 1 and User 2
Reference [Wang et al. (2016)] User and 1 User 2
1.5
50 100 150 200 250 300
Distance between two user d (m)

Figure 11: Comparison of the sum data rates of two users for different algorithms under
the distance between the two users
To further elaborate on the effectiveness of the proposed study, Fig. 12 compares the
spectral efficiency of the proposed algorithm and Zhu et al. [Zhu, Wang, Huang et al.
(2017); Timotheou and Krikidis (2015)] algorithms with an increasing number of users.
As can be seen from the results of Fig. 12, the spectral efficiency of the proposed
algorithm is better than Zhu et al. [Zhu, Wang, Huang et al. (2017); Timotheou and
Krikidis (2015)] algorithms, whereas, the spectral efficiency performance of Zhu et al.
[Zhu, Wang, Huang et al. (2017)] is better than Timotheou et al. [Timotheou and Krikidis
(2015)] algorithm. The results clearly indicate the superiority of the proposed scheme
over the existing schemes, especially, in large-number of user scenarios.
To evaluate the relative effectiveness of the proposed study from the perspective of energy
efficiency, Fig. 13 compares the energy efficiency versus the number of users. It can be
seen from Fig. 13 that; the energy efficiency of the proposed algorithm is better than Zhu et
al. [Zhu, Wang, Huang et al. (2017); Timotheou and Krikidis (2015)] for every number of
users. It is also revealed from these results that the energy efficiency gap of the proposed
and Zhu et al. [Zhu, Wang, Huang et al. (2017); Timotheou and Krikidis (2015)]
algorithms is large, which means that the proposed algorithm is more energy-efficient than
the existing schemes and requires less amount of energy for data transmission.
Proportional Fairness-Based Power Allocation Algorithm for Downlink 1587
800

Proposed Algorithm
700
Reference [Zhu et al. (2017)] Algorithm
Reference [Timoutheo (2015)] Algorithm
600

500

Spectral efficiency (bit/s/Hz)

400

300

200

100

0
10 15 20 25 30 35

Number of users

Figure 12: Comparison of the spectral efficiency of the proposed and existing algorithms
with an increasing number of users
60
Proposed Algorithm
Reference [Zhu et al. (2017)] Algorithm
50 Reference Timoutheo et al. (2015)] Algorithm

40
Energy Efficiency (bits/J/Hz)

30

20

10

0
10 15 20 25 30 35

Number of users

Figure 13: Comparison of the energy efficiency of the proposed and existing algorithms
with an increasing number of users

6 Conclusions and future recommendations

This paper mainly studies the power allocation problem of proportionally fair NOMA.
The objective is to ensure the fairness of the users at the edge of the cell. The objective
function is to maximize the fairness of multiplexed users. In the NOMA scenario, the
sum data rate of the two users is not less than the OMA scenario under the same
conditions. The data rate also satisfies the basic idea of NOMA, that is, users with poor
channel conditions allocate larger power, and users with better channel conditions
allocate less power. This paper subtly transforms the nonconvex optimization problem in
the objective function into a convex optimization problem and obtains the optimal value
1588 CMC, vol.65, no.2, pp.1571-1590, 2020

through KKT constrained optimization conditions. The simulation results show that
compared to OMA, the proposed NOMA algorithm has a better data rate and spectrum
utilization. Moreover, it has a larger improvement and compared with Liu et al. [Liu,
Onen and Petrova (2015)], it is superior in terms of user fairness. The above description in
the KKT condition of Section 4 is based on the case where two users are multiplexed in the
sub-band. Of course, the solution of m users is also theoretically satisfied. This part is the
focus of the next step of this paper which is the future work.
Acknowledgement: The authors would like to thank the reviewers for their time and
review.
Availability of Data and Materials: The data used for the findings of this study is
available upon request from the corresponding authors.
Funding Statement: This work is supported by SUT research and development fund.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to report
regarding the present study.

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