We consider a multi-user multi-server mobile edge computing (MEC) network with time-varying fading channels and formulate an offloading decision and resource allocation problem. To solve this mixed-integer non-convex problem, we propose two hybrid approaches that learn offloading strategy with DQN (opt-DQN) or Q-table (opt-QL) at each user equipment (UE). The communication resources are allocated with an optimization algorithm at each computational access point (CAP). We also propose a pure DQN method that learns both the offloading strategy and resource allocation via Q-learning (QL). We analyze the convergence behavior of the QL-based algorithms from a game-theoretical perspective and demonstrate the performance of the proposed hybrid approaches for different network sizes. The simulation results show that the hybrid approaches reach lower costs than other baseline algorithms and the pure-DQN approach. Moreover, the performance of the pure-DQN approach degrades severely as the network size increases, while opt-DQN still performs the best, followed by opt-QL. These observations demonstrate that the hybrid approach that combines the advantages of both QL and convex optimization is a promising design for a multi-user MEC network, wherein complicated offloading and resource allocation strategies need to be determined in a timely and accurate fashion.

Both intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) and non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) are the cutting-edge technologies for future wireless communications. In this work, we examine the effectiveness of IRS in NOMA system with respect to transmit power consumption. Towards this end, the power minimization problem for IRS-aided downlink NOMA system is formulated, taking into consideration the constraint of each user’s minimum signal-to-interference-ratio (SINR). To solve the joint power control and IRS phase shifts optimization problem, we first explore the relationship between individual user’s transmit power and the variables of phase shifts. Then, we solve the phase shift determination problem via the sequential rotation algorithm. Numerical results show that our designed joint optimization algorithm can significantly reduce the required transmit power when compared with various benchmarking schemes.

This paper investigates the power control problem for the downlink of a multi-cell non-orthogonal multiple access system. The problem, called P-OPT, aims to minimize the total transmit power of all the base stations subject to the data rate requirements of the users. The feasibility and optimality properties of P-OPT are characterized through a related optimization problem, called Q-OPT, which is constituted by some relevant power control subproblems. First, we characterize the feasibility of Q-OPT and prove the uniqueness of its optimal solution. Next, we prove that the feasibility of P-OPT can be characterized by the Perron-Frobenius eigenvalues of the matrices arising from the power control subproblems. Subsequently, the relationship between the optimal solutions to P-OPT and that to Q-OPT is presented, which motivates us to obtain the optimal solution to P-OPT through solving the corresponding Q-OPT. Furthermore, a distributed algorithm to solve Q-OPT is designed, and the underlying iteration is shown to be a standard interference function. According to Yates's power control framework, the algorithm always converges to the optimal solution if exists. Numerical results validate the convergence of the distributed algorithm and quantify the improvement of our proposed method over fractional transmit power control and orthogonal multiple access schemes in terms of power consumption and outage probability.

This paper investigates the joint subcarrier and power allocation problem for the downlink of a multi-carrier non-orthogonal multiple access (MC-NOMA) system. A novel three-step resource allocation framework is designed to deal with the sum rate maximization problem. In Step 1, we relax the problem by assuming that each of the users can use all the subcarriers simultaneously. With this assumption, we prove the convexity of the resultant power control problem and solve it via convex programming tools to get a power vector for each user. In Step 2, we allocate the subcarriers to users by a heuristic greedy manner with the obtained power vectors in Step 1. In Step 3, the proposed power control schemes used in Step 1 are applied once more to further improve the system performance with the obtained subcarrier assignment of Step 2. To solve the maximization problem with fixed subcarrier assignments in both Step 1 and Step 3, a centralized power allocation method based on projected gradient descent algorithm and two distributed power control strategies based, respectively, on pseudo-gradient algorithm and iterative waterfilling algorithm are investigated. Numerical results show that our proposed three-step resource allocation algorithm could achieve comparable sum rate performance to the existing near-optimal solution with much lower computational complexity and outperforms power controlled OMA scheme. Besides, a tradeoff between user fairness and sum rate performance can be achieved via applying different user power constraint strategies in the proposed algorithm.

This letter explores how pinching antennas, an advanced flexible-antenna system, can enhance the performance of integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) systems by leveraging their adaptability, cost-effectiveness, and ability to facilitate line-of-sight transmission. To achieve this, a joint antenna positioning and transmit power optimization problem is formulated to maximize the total communication data rate while meeting the target sensing requirements and the system energy constraint. To address the complex non-convex optimization problem, we propose a maximum entropy-based reinforcement learning (MERL) solution. By maximizing cumulative reward and policy entropy, this approach effectively balances exploration and exploitation to enhance robustness. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed MERL algorithm surpasses other benchmark schemes in cumulative reward, total data rate, sensing signal-to-noise ratio, and stability.

This paper investigates the power allocation problem for the downlink of an orthogonal frequency division multiple (OFDM) based non-orthogonal multiple access visible light communication (NOMA-VLC) system. Unlike the commonly used two-user OFDM-NOMA VLC model, in this work, arbitrary number of multiplexed users is considered when formulating the sum rate maximization problem. Moreover, both user-level and subcarrier-level power optimization are taken into account to improve the system performance. The corresponding theoretical analysis is presented, with the consideration of optimal decoding order and each user’s required signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR). Given a fixed power constraint on each OFDM subcarrier, we derive the optimal power ratio for arbitrary number of multiplexed users in OFDM-NOMA VLC. Numerical results show that with a required SINR of 3 dB, the proposed enhanced power allocation (EPA) algorithm has 39:59% and 40:11% sum-rate enhancement when compared to optimized fixed power allocation (FPA) algorithm and gain ratio power allocation (GRPA) algorithm, respectively.