1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a broadband wireless communication system. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus and method for supporting Peer-to-Peer (P2P) communication in a broadband wireless communication system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a conventional cellular system, a Mobile Station (MS) directly communicates with a Base Station (BS) by using radio resources managed by the BS. In other words, in order for two MSs to communicate with each other, the two MSs establish connections with the BS, and UpLink (UL) and DownLink (DL) radio resources are allocated by the BS. Then, the BS receives data from one of the MSs through one of the connections and transmits the data to the other MS through the other connection.
The two MSs may also communicate with each other in a Peer-to-Peer (P2P) manner. P2P communication is performed through a direct connection between the two MSs. A signal is directly transmitted/received between the two MSs. Examples of a wireless communication system supporting P2P communication include a Wireless world INitiative NEw Radio (WINNER) system of the Wireless World Initiative (WWI).
FIG. 1 illustrates a frame structure of the conventional WINNER system. A frame of the WINNER system is composed of super frames. One super frame includes a control signal region 110, a plurality of DL regions 120, a plurality of UL regions 130, and a P2P region 140. The P2P region 140 is a resource region which is allocated for P2P communication between MSs. Thus, the P2P region 140 is not used for communication between a BS and an MS. Accordingly, the MSs can perform P2P communication without interference from the BS.
However, by additionally allocating the resource region for P2P communication, an amount of resources to be used in traffic transmission/reception is reduced. Accordingly, a method in which a frequency band can be reused in a cellular system without having to allocate additional resources for P2P communication is needed. Specifically, there is a need for a method of searching for a frequency band to be used in a P2P communication without interfering with the cellular system.