A standard paradigm for the allocation of wireless resources/nin communication demands symmetry, that is, all users are/nassumed to be on equal footing and hence get equal shares of the/nsystem’s communication capabilities. However, there are situations/nin which “prime users” should be given priority, as for example/nin the transmission of emergency messages. We examine prioritization/npolicies that could be implemented at the physical layer/nand propose a new one, termed Interference Priority (IP), which/nis shown to have excellent performance. We evaluate the performance/nof these prioritization techniques both in controlled settings/nand within the context of a full cellular system and discuss the impact/nof prioritized use of resources on the unprioritized users.

This work was supported by the Project CONSOLIDER INGENIO/n2010 CSD2008-00010 “COMONSENS” and by a/nGrant from King Saud University.