Integrated power saving for relay node and user equipment in LTE-A

By introduction of relay nodes, LTE‐Advanced can provide enhanced coverage and capacity at cell edges and hot‐spot areas. The authors have been researching the issue of power saving in mobile communications technology such as WiMax and Long Term Evolution (LTE) for some years. Based on the previous idea of load‐based power saving, two strategies each with associated schemes to integrated relay nodes and user equipment in power saving are proposed in the paper. Simulation study shows the benefit of the proposed schemes in terms of better power saving than the standard‐based scheme at the cost of moderately increased delay. Extended discussion about the impact of different load distribution among user equipments and the impact of a worse backhaul link on power saving is also presented in the paper. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.