Fixed channel assignment optimization for cellular mobile networks

The optimization of channel assignment in cellular mobile networks is an NP -complete combinatorial optimization problem. For any reasonable size netwo rk, only sub-optimal solutions can be obtained by heuristic;algorithms. In this paper, six channel assignment heuristic algorithms are proposed and ev aluated. They are the combinations of three channel assignment strategies a nd two cell ordering methods. What we found are (i) the node-color ordering of cells is a more efficient ordering method than the node-degree ordering ; (ii) the frequency exhaustive strategy is more suitable for systems with highly non-uniformly distributed traffic, and the requirement exhaustive st rategy is more suitable for systems with less nonuniformly distributed traf fic; and (iii) the combined frequency and requirement exhaustive strategy w ith node-color re-ordering is the most efficient algorithm. The frequency s pans obtained using the proposed algorithms are much lower than that report ed in the literature, and in many cases are equal to the theoretical lower bounds.