Energy-Efficient Target Channel Sequence Design for Spectrum Handoffs in Cognitive Radio Networks

Cognitive radio is considered as an efficient way to improve the spectrum efficiency. As one of its key technologies, spectrum handoff can guarantee the transmission continuity of secondary users (SUs). In this paper, we address a new and more generalized spectrum handoff problem in cognitive radio networks (CRNs), by considering simultaneously energy efficiency, multiple spectrum handoffs and multiple channels. Furthermore, effects of the primary users' (PUs') arrival and service rate on the target channel sequence selection are also considered. In order to obtain the energy-efficient target channel sequence, we firstly analyze the energy consumption and the number of delivered bits per hertz in the spectrum handoff process, and formulate a ratio-type energy efficiency optimization problem, which can be transformed into a parametric problem by utilizing fractional programming. Then, we propose an algorithm combining dynamic programming with bisection (DPB) algorithm to solve the energy efficiency optimization problem. Our simulation results verify that the designed target channel sequence has better performance than the existing algorithms in terms of energy efficiency.