Coordinated dynamic point selection (DPS) with cell range expansion in a coordinated multipoint (CoMP) system

1. A method for mitigating edge effect interference in a Coordinated MultiPoint (CoMP) system having multiple CoMP clusters, comprising:

transmitting from a macro node a cell range expansion request to user equipments (UEs) within a cell to enable the UEs to apply a cell range expansion bias;

generating a CoMP cluster, from at least one of the macro node or a neighboring macro node, for nodes within the cell to include the UEs operating with the cell range expansion bias; and

coordinating blanked resources, from at least one of the macro node or the neighboring macro node, between a plurality of macro nodes for the CoMP clusters in the CoMP system using a muting preference including a blanked resource.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein transmitting the cell range expansion request further comprises:

sending the cell range expansion request for the UE to apply the cell range expansion bias, wherein the UE is adjacent to a receptor cell low power node (LPN) in a neighboring cell; and

coordinating, at the macro node, an handover of the UE from macro node to the receptor cell LPN based on the cell range expansion applied by the UE.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the cell range expansion bias uses a specified reference signal (RS) biasing having a range greater than 0 decibel (dB) to about 16 dB; and the UE measures an LPN RS to generate an LPN RS measurement selected from the group consisting of a reference signal received power (RSRP), a reference signal received quality (RSRQ), and combinations thereof.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein coordinating the blanked resources further comprises:

sending, from the macro node to a neighboring macro node in a neighboring CoMP cluster, a muting preference including the blanked resource of the macro node, to enable the neighboring macro node to reschedule the blanked resource for the neighboring CoMP cluster based on the muting preference of the macro node to align the blanked resource of the neighboring CoMP cluster to the CoMP cluster including the macro node, to enable the blanked resource to have a same frequency-domain index and a same time-domain index for both the neighboring CoMP cluster and the CoMP cluster.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein coordinating the blanked resources further comprises:

receiving, at the macro node from a neighboring macro node in a neighboring CoMP cluster, a muting preference including the blanked resource for the neighboring macro node; and

rescheduling the blanked resource at the macro node based on the muting preference of the neighboring macro node of a neighboring CoMP cluster to align the blanked resource of the CoMP cluster including the macro node to the neighboring CoMP cluster.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the blanked resource has a one subframe granularity in a time domain or a one resource block group (RBG) granularity in a frequency domain.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein coordinating the blanked resources uses X2 signaling or backhaul link signaling via a wired connection, a wireless connection, or an optical fiber connection.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein coordinating the blanked resources uses one bit to represent one subframe where the one bit indicates each blanked resource or transmission resource for the subframe; and the muting preference includes a resource map selected from the group consisting of a bit array, a bitmap, a bitset, a bitstring, a data array, a list, a string, a table, and combinations thereof; and the muting preference is transmitted with a periodicity of at least 500 milliseconds.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

scheduling resources for data transmission for a low power node (LPN) with the macro node muted or for both the LPN and the macro node using dynamic point selection (DPS) and dynamic point blanking (DPB).

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the nodes in the cell are selected from the group consisting of a base station (BS), a Node B (NB), an evolved Node B (eNB), a baseband unit (BBU), a remote radio head (RRH), a remote radio equipment (RRE), a remote radio unit (RRU), and combinations thereof.

11. At least one non-transitory machine readable storage medium comprising a plurality of instructions adapted to be executed to implement the method of claim 1 .

12. A coordinating device of a node configured for offloading a user equipment (UE) from a Coordinated MultiPoint (CoMP) cluster to a neighboring CoMP cluster, comprising:

a transceiver module to:

send a cell range expansion request to a UE that requests the UE to use a cell range expansion bias;

receive a re-association request from the UE for the UE to associate with a low power node (LPN) in the neighboring CoMP cluster and offload traffic from the node; and

transmit a muting preference including a scheduled blanked resource for the node to a neighboring macro node in the neighboring CoMP cluster to enable the neighboring macro node to align the blanked resource of the neighboring CoMP cluster to the CoMP cluster including the node.

13. The coordinating device of claim 12 , wherein the transceiver module is further configured to:

receive, from a neighboring macro node in the neighboring CoMP cluster, a muting preference including a scheduled blanked resource for the neighboring macro node; and

the coordinating device further comprises:

a processing module to:

reschedule the blanked resource at the node based on the muting preference of the neighboring macro node to align the scheduled blanked resource of the CoMP cluster including the node to the neighboring macro node.

14. The coordinating device of claim 13 , wherein the blanked resources includes at least one subframe in a time domain or at least one resource block group (RBG) in a frequency domain.

15. The coordinating device of claim 13 , wherein the transceiver module is configured to receive the muting preference of blanked resources from the neighboring macro node using X2 signaling or backhaul link signaling via a wired connection, a wireless connection, or an optical fiber connection; and the blanked resource is selected from the group consisting of a radio subframe, a slot, a frequency carrier, a frequency subcarrier, a physical resource block (PRB), and combinations thereof.

16. The coordinating device of claim 12 , further comprising:

a processing module to:

generate the CoMP cluster to include a neighboring UE formerly in the neighboring CoMP cluster, wherein the neighboring UE is associated with the node or the CoMP cluster due to cell range expansion, and

apply dynamic point selection (DPS) or dynamic point blanking (DPB) in scheduling resources for the neighboring UE.

17. The coordinating device of claim 12 , further comprising:

a processing module to:

apply an enhanced inter-cell interference coordination (eICIC) in the time domain for semi-statically scheduling resources for the UE.

18. The wireless device of claim 12 , wherein the node is selected from the group consisting of a base station (BS), a Node B (NB), an evolved Node B (eNB), a macro node, a low power node (LPN), a baseband unit (BBU), a remote radio head (RRH), a remote radio equipment (RRE), a remote radio unit (RRU), a central processing module (CPM), and combinations thereof; the macro node includes a macro evolved Node B (macro-eNB) and the LPN includes a micro-eNB, a pico-eNB, a femto-eNB, a home eNB (HeNB), RRH, RRE, or RRU; and the wireless device is selected from the group consisting of a user equipment (UE) and a mobile station (MS), and the wireless device includes at least one of an antenna, a touch sensitive display screen, a speaker, a microphone, a graphics processor, an application processor, internal memory, a non-volatile memory port, and combinations thereof.