  Mobile communication networks have witnessed a perpetual evolution since
their launching as voice only networks. In the few past years, the focus was
addressed to high data rate networks that offer high quality of service. The
lately released LTE-Advanced network was the first to completely fulfill 4G
requirements. However, performance gains remain limited due to severe
interference levels. This paper is a survey upon the evolution of interference
mitigation solutions from Release 8 to Release 11. This problem was addressed
since earlier releases by coordinating transmission/reception among different
cells. Many enhancements were then carried out by each subsequent
specification. The originality of this work resides on the comparison between
the different schemes and the perspective of developing a new interference
coordination method available for 4G and beyond systems with small cells
deployment. Several similarities are noted and differences on performance
impact are highlighted.
