Title: The channel allocation problem in broadband power line communications access networks: analysis, modelling and solutions

Authors: Abdelfatteh Haidine, Ralf Lehnert

Addresses: Communications Laboratory, Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Technische Universitaet Dresden, Dresden 01062, Germany. ' Communications Laboratory, Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Technische Universitaet Dresden, Dresden 01062, Germany

Abstract: Broadband power line communications (B-PLC) is a recent developed technology of the realisation of the broadband access networks. The planning process of those networks is composed of two problems: the generalised base station placement problem and the PLC channel allocation problem (P-CAP). In this paper, the P-CAP is investigated. These investigations include the problem description, the mathematical formulation of its optimisation objectives, and the solution of the problem by the means of meta-heuristics. The channel allocation problems in B-PLC and in wireless networks are compared. The P-CAP is formulated as a multi-objective optimisation problem (MOP), where the resource reuse maximisation and interferences minimisation are the conflicting objectives. Two approaches are applied to solve the P-CAP as MOP: a classical approach that converts the multi-objective optimisation (MOO) problem into a single-objective optimisation (SOO) problem; and a more recent approach based on the MOO algorithms. The performances of SOO and MOO are evaluated by numerical experiments, using optimisation search that is based on the evolutionary algorithm.

Keywords: broadband power line communications; channel allocation; network design; interference minimisation; multi-objective combinatorial optimisation; evolutionary algorithms; modelling; broadband access networks; wireless networks; resource reuse maximisation; interference minimisation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJAACS.2010.035546

International Journal of Autonomous and Adaptive Communications Systems, 2010 Vol.3 No.4, pp.396 - 418

Published online: 30 Sep 2010 *

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