Cyclic Distributed Space–Time Codes for Wireless Relay Networks With No Channel Information

In this paper, we present a coding strategy for half duplex wireless relay networks, where we assume no channel knowledge at any of the transmitter, receiver, or relays. The coding scheme uses distributed space–time coding, that is, the relay nodes cooperate to encode the transmitted signal so that the receiver senses a space–time codeword. It is inspired by noncoherent differential techniques. The proposed strategy is available for any number of relays nodes. It is analyzed, and shown to yield a diversity linear in the number of relays. We also study the resistance of the scheme to relay node failures, and show that a network with R relay nodes and d of them down behaves, as far as diversity is concerned, as a network with R-d nodes. Finally, our construction can be easily generalized to the case where the transmitter and receiver nodes have several antennas

A coding scheme for wireless networks with multiple antenna nodes and no channel information

In this paper, we present a coding strategy for wireless relay networks where the relay nodes are small devices with few resources, while the source and sink are equipped with multiple antennas to increase the transmission rate. We assume no channel knowledge at all, and the receiver decodes knowing none of the channel paths. This coding scheme uses distributed space-time coding techniques and is inspired by noncoherent differential space-time coding. It is shown to yield a diversity linear in the minimum number of transmit/receive antennas times the number of relays

Dispensing with channel estimation: differentially modulated cooperative wireless communications

As a benefit of bypassing the potentially excessive complexity and yet inaccurate channel estimation, differentially encoded modulation in conjunction with low-complexity noncoherent detection constitutes a viable candidate for user-cooperative systems, where estimating all the links by the relays is unrealistic. In order to stimulate further research on differentially modulated cooperative systems, a number of fundamental challenges encountered in their practical implementations are addressed, including the time-variant-channel-induced performance erosion, flexible cooperative protocol designs, resource allocation as well as its high-spectral-efficiency transceiver design. Our investigations demonstrate the quantitative benefits of cooperative wireless networks both from a pure capacity perspective as well as from a practical system design perspective

Algebraic Distributed Differential Space-Time Codes with Low Decoding Complexity

The differential encoding/decoding setup introduced by Kiran et al, Oggier-Hassibi and Jing-Jafarkhani for wireless relay networks that use codebooks consisting of unitary matrices is extended to allow codebooks consisting of scaled unitary matrices. For such codebooks to be usable in the Jing-Hassibi protocol for cooperative diversity, the conditions involving the relay matrices and the codebook that need to be satisfied are identified. Using the algebraic framework of extended Clifford algebras, a new class of Distributed Differential Space-Time Codes satisfying these conditions for power of two number of relays and also achieving full cooperative diversity with a low complexity sub-optimal receiver is proposed. Simulation results indicate that the proposed codes outperform both the cyclic codes as well as the circulant codes. Furthermore, these codes can also be applied as Differential Space-Time codes for non-coherent communication in classical point to point multiple antenna systems.Comment: To appear in IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications. 10 pages, 5 figure

Distributed convolutional-coded differential space-time block coding for cooperative communications

A low complexity distributed coding scheme is proposed for communications over Rayleigh fading channels. Convolutional Coding (CC) assisted Differential Phase-Shift Keying (DPSK) modulation is employed at the source node for conveying the source signals to two relay nodes as well as to the destination node during the first transmission period. Iterative detection exchanging extrinsic information between the DPSK demapper and CC decoder is carried out at each relay node in order to recover the source signals. Then, the CC-encoded bits are re-encoded by the two relays to generate Differential Space-Time Block Coding (DSTBC) symbols for transmission to the destination node during the second transmission period. At the destination node, iterative decoding exchanging extrinsic information is invoked between the DPSK demapper and the concatenated CC-DSTBC decoder, where the later is viewed as a single amalgamated decoder. The relay and destination nodes do not have to estimate the channel’s fading coefficients due to the employment of DPSK and DSTBC schemes. Our design requires only two decoding iterations between the DPSK and CC decoders at each relay in order to further reduce the complexity of the relay nodes. Our distributed coding scheme assisted by two low-complexity relay nodes outperforms the non-cooperative benchmarker scheme by about 8 dBs, when aiming for a bit error ratio of 10-5

Noncoherent Low-Decoding-Complexity Space-Time Codes for Wireless Relay Networks

The differential encoding/decoding setup introduced by Kiran et al, Oggier et al and Jing et al for wireless relay networks that use codebooks consisting of unitary matrices is extended to allow codebooks consisting of scaled unitary matrices. For such codebooks to be used in the Jing-Hassibi protocol for cooperative diversity, the conditions that need to be satisfied by the relay matrices and the codebook are identified. A class of previously known rate one, full diversity, four-group encodable and four-group decodable Differential Space-Time Codes (DSTCs) is proposed for use as Distributed DSTCs (DDSTCs) in the proposed set up. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first known low decoding complexity DDSTC scheme for cooperative wireless networks.Comment: 5 pages, no figures. To appear in Proceedings of IEEE ISIT 2007, Nice, Franc

Performance Modelling and Optimisation of Multi-hop Networks

A major challenge in the design of large-scale networks is to predict and optimise the total time and energy consumption required to deliver a packet from a source node to a destination node. Examples of such complex networks include wireless ad hoc and sensor networks which need to deal with the effects of node mobility, routing inaccuracies, higher packet loss rates, limited or time-varying effective bandwidth, energy constraints, and the computational limitations of the nodes. They also include more reliable communication environments, such as wired networks, that are susceptible to random failures, security threats and malicious behaviours which compromise their quality of service (QoS) guarantees. In such networks, packets traverse a number of hops that cannot be determined in advance and encounter non-homogeneous network conditions that have been largely ignored in the literature. This thesis examines analytical properties of packet travel in large networks and investigates the implications of some packet coding techniques on both QoS and resource utilisation. Specifically, we use a mixed jump and diffusion model to represent packet traversal through large networks. The model accounts for network non-homogeneity regarding routing and the loss rate that a packet experiences as it passes successive segments of a source to destination route. A mixed analytical-numerical method is developed to compute the average packet travel time and the energy it consumes. The model is able to capture the effects of increased loss rate in areas remote from the source and destination, variable rate of advancement towards destination over the route, as well as of defending against malicious packets within a certain distance from the destination. We then consider sending multiple coded packets that follow independent paths to the destination node so as to mitigate the effects of losses and routing inaccuracies. We study a homogeneous medium and obtain the time-dependent properties of the packet’s travel process, allowing us to compare the merits and limitations of coding, both in terms of delivery times and energy efficiency. Finally, we propose models that can assist in the analysis and optimisation of the performance of inter-flow network coding (NC). We analyse two queueing models for a router that carries out NC, in addition to its standard packet routing function. The approach is extended to the study of multiple hops, which leads to an optimisation problem that characterises the optimal time that packets should be held back in a router, waiting for coding opportunities to arise, so that the total packet end-to-end delay is minimised