  The considered problem is that of maximizing the degrees of freedom (DoF) in
cellular downlink, under a backhaul load constraint that limits the number of
messages that can be delivered from a centralized controller to the base
station transmitters. A linear interference channel model is considered, where
each transmitter is connected to the receiver having the same index as well as
one succeeding receiver. The backhaul load is defined as the sum of all the
messages available at all the transmitters normalized by the number of users.
When the backhaul load is constrained to an integer level B, the asymptotic per
user DoF is shown to equal (4B-1)/(4B), and it is shown that the optimal
assignment of messages to transmitters is asymmetric and satisfies a local
cooperation constraint and that the optimal coding scheme relies only on
zero-forcing transmit beamforming. Finally, an extension of the presented
coding scheme is shown to apply for more general locally connected and
two-dimensional networks.
