Area Spectral Efficiency and Coverage for Mixed Duplexing Networks with Directional Transmissions

In this paper, we consider a system of small cells assuming full duplex (FD) capable base stations (BSs) and half duplex (HD) user equipment (UEs). We investigate a mixed duplexing cellular system composed of FD and HD cells, when BSs are using directional transmissions. A stochastic geometry based model of the proposed system is used to derive the coverage and area spectral efficiency (ASE) of both BSs and UEs. The effect of FD cells on the performance of the mixed system is presented under different degree of directionality at the BSs. We show that enabling directional transmissions at the BSs yields significant ASE and coverage gain in both downlink and uplink directions. With directional transmissions, the ASE increases rapidly with the number of FD cells while the drop in the coverage rate due to FD operations reduces significantly.