Coding for Cooperative Communications

The area of cooperative communications has received tremendous research interest in recent years. This interest is not unwarranted, since cooperative communications promises the ever-so-sought after diversity and multiplexing gains typically associated with multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communications, without actually employing multiple antennas. In this dissertation, we consider several cooperative communication channels, and for each one of them, we develop information theoretic coding schemes and derive their corresponding performance limits. We next develop and design practical coding strategies which perform very close to the information theoretic limits. The cooperative communication channels we consider are: (a) The Gaussian relay channel, (b) the quasi-static fading relay channel, (c) cooperative multiple-access channel (MAC), and (d) the cognitive radio channel (CRC). For the Gaussian relay channel, we propose a compress-forward (CF) coding strategy based on Wyner-Ziv coding, and derive the achievable rates specifically with BPSK modulation. The CF strategy is implemented with low-density parity-check (LDPC) and irregular repeataccumulate codes and is found to operate within 0.34 dB of the theoretical limit. For the quasi-static fading relay channel, we assume that no channel state information (CSI) is available at the transmitters and propose a rateless coded protocol which uses rateless coded versions of the CF and the decode-forward (DF) strategy. We implement the protocol with carefully designed Raptor codes and show that the implementation suffers a loss of less than 10 percent from the information theoretical limit. For the MAC, we assume quasi-static fading, and consider cooperation in the low-power regime with the assumption that no CSI is available at the transmitters. We develop cooperation methods based on multiplexed coding in conjunction with rateless codes and find the achievable rates and in particular the minimum energy per bit to achieve a certain outage probability. We then develop practical coding methods using Raptor codes, which performs within 1.1 dB of the performance limit. Finally, we consider a CRC and develop a practical multi-level dirty-paper coding strategy using LDPC codes for channel coding and trellis-coded quantization for source coding. The designed scheme is found to operate within 0.78 dB of the theoretical limit. By developing practical coding strategies for several cooperative communication channels which exhibit performance close to the information theoretic limits, we show that cooperative communications not only provide great benefits in theory, but can possibly promise the same benefits when put into practice. Thus, our work can be considered a useful and necessary step towards the commercial realization of cooperative communications

Optimisation of relay placement in wireless butterfly networks

As a typical model of multicast network, wireless butterfly networks (WBNs) have been studied for modelling the scenario when two source nodes wish to convey data to two destination nodes via an intermediary node namely relay node. In the context of wireless communications, when receiving two data packets from the two source nodes, the relay node can employ either physical-layer network coding or analogue network coding on the combined packet prior to forwarding to the two destination nodes. Evaluating the energy efficiency of these combination approaches, energy-delay trade-off (EDT) is worth to be investigated and the relay placement should be taken into account in the practical network design. This chapter will first investigate the EDT of network coding in the WBNs. Based on the derived EDT, algorithms that optimize the relay position will be developed to either minimize the transmission delay or minimize the energy consumption subject to constraints on power allocation and location of nodes. Furthermore, considering an extended model of the WBN, the relay placement will be studied for a general wireless multicast network with multiple source, relay and destination nodes

Radio Communications

In the last decades the restless evolution of information and communication technologies (ICT) brought to a deep transformation of our habits. The growth of the Internet and the advances in hardware and software implementations modified our way to communicate and to share information. In this book, an overview of the major issues faced today by researchers in the field of radio communications is given through 35 high quality chapters written by specialists working in universities and research centers all over the world. Various aspects will be deeply discussed: channel modeling, beamforming, multiple antennas, cooperative networks, opportunistic scheduling, advanced admission control, handover management, systems performance assessment, routing issues in mobility conditions, localization, web security. Advanced techniques for the radio resource management will be discussed both in single and multiple radio technologies; either in infrastructure, mesh or ad hoc networks

Time diversity solutions to cope with lost packets

A dissertation submitted to Departamento de Engenharia Electrotécnica of Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia of Universidade Nova de Lisboa in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Engenharia Electrotécnica e de ComputadoresModern broadband wireless systems require high throughputs and can also have very high Quality-of-Service (QoS) requirements, namely small error rates and short delays. A high spectral efficiency is needed to meet these requirements. Lost packets, either due to errors or collisions, are usually discarded and need to be retransmitted, leading to performance degradation. An alternative to simple retransmission that can improve both power and spectral efficiency is to combine the signals associated to different transmission attempts. This thesis analyses two time diversity approaches to cope with lost packets that are relatively similar at physical layer but handle different packet loss causes. The first is a lowcomplexity Diversity-Combining (DC) Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ) scheme employed in a Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) architecture, adapted for channels dedicated to a single user. The second is a Network-assisted Diversity Multiple Access (NDMA) scheme, which is a multi-packet detection approach able to separate multiple mobile terminals transmitting simultaneously in one slot using temporal diversity. This thesis combines these techniques with Single Carrier with Frequency Division Equalizer (SC-FDE) systems, which are widely recognized as the best candidates for the uplink of future broadband wireless systems. It proposes a new NDMA scheme capable of handling more Mobile Terminals (MTs) than the user separation capacity of the receiver. This thesis also proposes a set of analytical tools that can be used to analyse and optimize the use of these two systems. These tools are then employed to compare both approaches in terms of error rate, throughput and delay performances, and taking the implementation complexity into consideration. Finally, it is shown that both approaches represent viable solutions for future broadband wireless communications complementing each other.Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia - PhD grant(SFRH/BD/41515/2007); CTS multi-annual funding project PEst-OE/EEI/UI0066/2011, IT pluri-annual funding project PEst-OE/EEI/LA0008/2011, U-BOAT project PTDC/EEATEL/ 67066/2006, MPSat project PTDC/EEA-TEL/099074/2008 and OPPORTUNISTICCR project PTDC/EEA-TEL/115981/200

Reaching Network Ubiquity through a New Concept of Mobile Terminal

[EN] The concept of mobile system as we know it today is about to change. It is expected that by 2020 the networks become cooperative and users collaborate in the transmission of information to other devices. This new paradigm of mobile relaying implies a set of new challenges that the scientific community is currently addressing. This paper introduces this new paradigm for mobile ommunications as well as the main problems, possible solutions, the current state of technology and most appealing research trends.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science under the project TEC2011-27723-C02-02.Cabrejas Peñuelas, J.; Chaparro Valero, PA.; Monserrat Del Río, JF.; Cardona Marcet, N. (2012). Reaching Network Ubiquity through a New Concept of Mobile Terminal. Waves. 4:89-98. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/649788998

Ultra Wideband

Ultra wideband (UWB) has advanced and merged as a technology, and many more people are aware of the potential for this exciting technology. The current UWB field is changing rapidly with new techniques and ideas where several issues are involved in developing the systems. Among UWB system design, the UWB RF transceiver and UWB antenna are the key components. Recently, a considerable amount of researches has been devoted to the development of the UWB RF transceiver and antenna for its enabling high data transmission rates and low power consumption. Our book attempts to present current and emerging trends in-research and development of UWB systems as well as future expectations

Relay communications over frequency-selective fading channels

Wireless communications over long distances can be assisted by a third radio acting as a relay. If the relay is placed close to the source, then the source-relay link will be characterized as a fairly benign additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel. However, the long distance link from relay to destination is susceptible to frequency-selective fading. This thesis explores the design and analysis of a particular relay communication system characterized by a low power source, a relay that is close to the source, and a frequency-selective channel from relay to destination. Because the direct link from source to destination is very weak, it is not exploited, but rather communications is via a traditional two-hop process.;Link design is based on the high speed download packet access (HSDPA) standard, which uses a combination of turbo coding, hybrid-ARQ, and multicode CDMA. To provide further diversity, the relay-destination link uses a secondary spreading code, rake reception, and multiple receive antennas. An extensive analysis was conducted to study the influence of a wide variety of link configurations and channel conditions. The study was accelerated through the use of a quasi-analytical approach based on the concept of information-outage, which allows the link to be simulated without requiring a turbo decoder

LTE Advanced: Technology and Performance Analysis

Wireless data usage is increasing at a phenomenal rate and driving the need for continued innovations in wireless data technologies to provide more capacity and higher quality of service. In October 2009, 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) submitted LTE-Advanced to the ITU as a proposed candidate IMT-Advanced technology for which specifications could become available in 2011 through Release-10 . The aim of “LTE-Advanced” is to further enhance LTE radio access in terms of system performance and capabilities compared to current cellular systems, including the first release of LTE, with a specific goal to ensure that LTE fulfills and even surpass the requirements of “IMT-Advanced” as defined by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU-R) . This thesis offers an introduction to the mobile communication standard known as LTE Advanced, depicting the evolution of the standard from its roots and discussing several important technologies that help it evolve to accomplishing the IMT-Advanced requirements. A short history of the LTE standard is offered, along with a discussion of its standards and performance. LTE-Advanced details include analysis on the physical layer by investigating the performance of SC-FDMA and OFDMA of LTE physical layer. The investigation is done by considering different modulation schemes (QPSK, 16QAM and 64QAM) on the basis of PAPR, BER, power spectral density (PSD) and error probability by simulating the model of SC-FDMA & OFDMA. To evaluate the performance in presence of noise, an Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) channel was introduced. A set of conclusions is derived from our results describing the effect of higher order modulation schemes on BER and error probability for both OFDMA and SC-FDMA. The power spectral densities of both the multiple access techniques (OFDMA and SC-FDMA) are calculated and result shows that the OFDMA has higher power spectral density.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format