Practical distributed scheduling for QoS-aware small cell mmWave mesh backhaul network

With the explosive growth of mobile data demand, small cells densely deployed underlying the homogeneous macrocells are emerging as a promising candidate for the fifth generation (5G) mobile network. The backhaul communication for small cells poses a significant challenge. However, with huge bandwidth available in the mmWave band, the wireless backhaul at mmWave frequencies can be a promising backhaul solution for small cells. In this paper, we propose Distributed Maximum QoS-aware (DMQ) scheduling algorithm for the mmWave backhaul network of small cells to maximize the system throughput while satisfying QoS requirements for each flow. Based on CSMA/CA, the proposed algorithm is the first that prioritizes MAC contention window to provide better concurrent transmission support while achieving QoS-aware capability. Simulations in the 73  GHz band are conducted to demonstrate 25%-40% performance boost in terms of system throughput and packet loss ratio against other existing schemes.