Intelligent Reflecting Surface Assisted NOMA over Fading Channels

Abstract

This paper considers a two-user downlink intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) assisted network over fading channels. Particularly, non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) and two orthogonal multiple access (OMA) schemes, namely, time division multiple access (TDMA) and frequency division multiple access (FDMA), are studied. Our goal is maximizing the system average sum rate for delay-tolerant transmission. The power budget, minimum average user rate and discrete unit modulus reflection coefficient constraints are considered as constraints. To solve the problem, phase shifters adjustment algorithms with low complexity are proposed to obtain high quality solutions. With given phase shifters, the optimal power allocation is obtained using the Lagrangian dual decomposition. Numerical results demonstrate the performance gain by introducing IRS into the system as well as the utility of the proposed algorithms.