Cooperative Diversity with Mobile Nodes: Capacity Outage Rate and Duration

The outage probability is an important performance measure for cooperative diversity schemes. However, in mobile environments, the outage probability does not completely describe the behavior of cooperative diversity schemes since the mobility of the involved nodes introduces variations in the channel gains. As a result, the capacity outage events are correlated in time and second-order statistical parameters of the achievable information-theoretic capacity such as the average capacity outage rate (AOR) and the average capacity outage duration (AOD) are required to obtain a more complete description of the properties of cooperative diversity protocols. In this paper, assuming slow Rayleigh fading, we derive exact expressions for the AOR and the AOD of three well-known cooperative diversity protocols: variable-gain amplify-and-forward, decode-and-forward, and selection decode-and-forward relaying. Furthermore, we develop asymptotically tight high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) approximations, which offer important insights into the influence of various system and channel parameters on the AOR and AOD. In particular, we show that on a double-logarithmic scale, similar to the outage probability, the AOR asymptotically decays with the SNR with a slope that depends on the diversity gain of the cooperative protocol, whereas the AOD asymptotically decays with a slope of -1/2 independent of the diversity gain.Comment: IEEE Transactions on Information Theory (2011

Wirelessly Powered Backscatter Communication Networks: Modeling, Coverage and Capacity

Future Internet-of-Things (IoT) will connect billions of small computing devices embedded in the environment and support their device-to-device (D2D) communication. Powering this massive number of embedded devices is a key challenge of designing IoT since batteries increase the devices' form factors and battery recharging/replacement is difficult. To tackle this challenge, we propose a novel network architecture that enables D2D communication between passive nodes by integrating wireless power transfer and backscatter communication, which is called a wirelessly powered backscatter communication (WP-BackCom) network. In the network, standalone power beacons (PBs) are deployed for wirelessly powering nodes by beaming unmodulated carrier signals to targeted nodes. Provisioned with a backscatter antenna, a node transmits data to an intended receiver by modulating and reflecting a fraction of a carrier signal. Such transmission by backscatter consumes orders-of-magnitude less power than a traditional radio. Thereby, the dense deployment of low-complexity PBs with high transmission power can power a large-scale IoT. In this paper, a WP-BackCom network is modeled as a random Poisson cluster process in the horizontal plane where PBs are Poisson distributed and active ad-hoc pairs of backscatter communication nodes with fixed separation distances form random clusters centered at PBs. The backscatter nodes can harvest energy from and backscatter carrier signals transmitted by PBs. Furthermore, the transmission power of each node depends on the distance from the associated PB. Applying stochastic geometry, the network coverage probability and transmission capacity are derived and optimized as functions of backscatter parameters, including backscatter duty cycle and reflection coefficient, as well as the PB density. The effects of the parameters on network performance are characterized.Comment: 28 pages, 11 figures, has been submitted to IEEE Trans. on Wireless Communicatio

Interference Mitigation in Frequency Hopping Ad Hoc Networks

Radio systems today exhibit a degree of flexibility that was unheard of only a few years ago. Software-defined radio architectures have emerged that are able to service large swathes of spectrum, covering up to several GHz in the UHF bands. This dissertation investigates interference mitigation techniques in frequency hopping ad hoc networks that are capable of exploiting the frequency agility of software-defined radio platforms

Rate enhancement and multi-relay selection schemes for application in wireless cooperative networks

In this thesis new methods are presented to achieve performance enhancement in wireless cooperative networks. In particular, techniques to improve transmission rate, mitigate asynchronous transmission and maximise end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio are described. An offset transmission scheme with full interference cancellation for a two-hop synchronous network with frequency flat links and four relays is introduced. This approach can asymptotically, as the symbol block size increases, achieve maximum transmission rate together with full cooperative diversity provided the destination node has multiple antennas. A novel full inter-relay interference cancellation method that also achieves asymptotically maximum rate and full cooperative diversity is then designed which only requires a single antenna at the destination node. Extension to asynchronous networks is then considered through the use of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) type transmission with a cyclic prefix, and interference cancellation techniques are designed for situations when synchronization errors are present in only the second hop or both the first and second hop. End-to-end bit error rate evaluations, with and without outer coding, are used to assess the performance of the various offset transmission schemes. Multi-relay selection methods for cooperative amplify and forward type networks are then studied in order to overcome the degradation of end-to-end bit error rate performance in single-relay selection networks when there are feedback errors in the destination to relay node links. Outage probability analysis for two and four relay selection is performed to show the advantage of multi-relay selection when no interference occurs and when adjacent cell interference is present both at the relay nodes and the destination node. Simulation studies are included which support the theoretical expressions. Finally, outage probability analysis of a cognitive amplify and forward type relay network with cooperation between certain secondary users, chosen by single and multi-relay (two and four) selection is presented. The cognitive relays are assumed to exploit an underlay approach, which requires adherence to an interference constraint on the primary user. The relay selection is performed either with a max-min strategy or one based on maximising exact end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio. The analyses are again confirmed by numerical evaluations

Modified quasi-orthogonal space-time block coding in distributed wireless networks

Cooperative networks have developed as a useful technique that can achieve the same advantage as multi-input and multi-output (MIMO) wireless systems such as spatial diversity, whilst resolving the difficulties of co-located multiple antennas at individual nodes and avoiding the effect of path-loss and shadowing. Spatial diversity in cooperative networks is known as cooperative diversity, and can enhance system reliability without sacrificing the scarce bandwidth resource or consuming more transmit power. It enables single-antenna terminals in a wireless relay network to share their antennas to form a virtual antenna array on the basis of their distributed locations. However, there remain technical challenges to maximize the benefit of cooperative communications, e.g. data rate, asynchronous transmission and outage. In this thesis, therefore, firstly, a modified distributed quasi-orthogonal space-time block coding (M-D-QO-STBC) scheme with increased code gain distance (CGD) for one-way and two-way amplify-and-forward wireless relay networks is proposed. This modified code is designed from set partitioning a larger codebook formed from two quasi-orthogonal space time block codes with different signal rotations then the subcodes are combined and pruned to arrive at the modified codebook with the desired rate in order to increase the CGD. Moreover, for higher rate codes the code distance is maximized by using a genetic algorithm to search for the optimum rotation matrix. This scheme has very good performance and significant coding gain over existing codes such as the open-loop and closed-loop QO-STBC schemes. In addition, the topic of outage probability analysis in the context of multi-relay selection from $N$ available relay nodes for one-way amplify-and-forward cooperative relay networks is considered together with the best relay selection, the $N^{th}$ relay selection and best four relay selection in two-way amplify-and-forward cooperative relay networks. The relay selection is performed either on the basis of a max-min strategy or one based on maximizing exact end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio. Furthermore, in this thesis, robust schemes for cooperative relays based on the M-D-QO-STBC scheme for both one-way and two-way asynchronous cooperative relay networks are considered to overcome the issue of a synchronism in wireless cooperative relay networks. In particular, an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) data structure is employed with cyclic prefix (CP) insertion at the source in the one-way cooperative relay network and at the two terminal nodes in the two-way cooperative network to combat the effects of time asynchronism. As such, this technique can effectively cope with the effects of timing errors. Finally, outage probability performance of a proposed amplify-and-forward cooperative cognitive relay network is evaluated and the cognitive relays are assumed to exploit an overlay approach. A closed form expression for the outage probability for multi-relay selection cooperation over Rayleigh frequency flat fading channels is derived for perfect and imperfect spectrum acquisitions. Furthermore, the M-QO-STBC scheme is also proposed for use in wireless cognitive relay networks. MATLAB and Maple software based simulations are employed throughout the thesis to support the analytical results and assess the performance of new algorithms and methods

Outage Probability Analysis of Full-Duplex Amplify-and-Forward MIMO Relay Systems

abstract: Multiple-input multiple-output systems have gained focus in the last decade due to the benefits they provide in enhancing the quality of communications. On the other hand, full-duplex communication has attracted remarkable attention due to its ability to improve the spectral efficiency compared to the existing half-duplex systems. Using full-duplex communications on MIMO co-operative networks can provide us solutions that can completely outperform existing systems with simultaneous transmission and reception at high data rates. This thesis considers a full-duplex MIMO relay which amplifies and forwards the received signals, between a source and a destination that do not a have line of sight. Full-duplex mode raises the problem of self-interference. Though all the links in the system undergo frequency flat fading, the end-to-end effective channel is frequency selective. This is due to the imperfect cancellation of the self-interference at the relay and this residual self-interference acts as intersymbol interference at the destination which is treated by equalization. This also leads to complications in form of recursive equations to determine the input-output relationship of the system. This also leads to complications in the form of recursive equations to determine the input-output relationship of the system. To overcome this, a signal flow graph approach using Mason's gain formula is proposed, where the effective channel is analyzed with keen notice to every loop and path the signal traverses. This gives a clear understanding and awareness about the orders of the polynomials involved in the transfer function, from which desired conclusions can be drawn. But the complexity of Mason's gain formula increases with the number of antennas at relay which can be overcome by the proposed linear algebraic method. Input-output relationship derived using simple concepts of linear algebra can be generalized to any number of antennas and the computation complexity is comparatively very low. For a full-duplex amplify-and-forward MIMO relay system, assuming equalization at the destination, new mechanisms have been implemented at the relay that can compensate the effect of residual self-interference namely equal-gain transmission and antenna selection. Though equal-gain transmission does not perform better than the maximal ratio transmission, a trade-off can be made between performance and implementation complexity. Using the proposed antenna selection strategy, one pair of transmit-receive antennas at the relay is selected based on four selection criteria discussed. Outage probability analysis is performed for all the strategies presented and detailed comparison has been established. Considering minimum mean-squared error decision feedback equalizer at the destination, a bound on the outage probability has been obtained for the antenna selection case and is used for comparisons. A cross-over point is observed while comparing the outage probabilities of equal-gain transmission and antenna selection techniques, as the signal-to-noise ratio increases and from that point antenna selection outperforms equal-gain transmission and this is explained by the fact of reduced residual self-interference in antenna selection method.Dissertation/ThesisMasters Thesis Electrical Engineering 201

Energy Efficient Cooperative Communication

This dissertation studies several problems centered around developing a better understanding of the energy efficiency of cooperative wireless communication systems. Cooperative communication is a technique where two or more nodes in a wireless network pool their antenna resources to form a virtual antenna array . Over the last decade, researchers have shown that many of the benefits of real antenna arrays, e.g. spatial diversity, increased range, and/or decreased transmission energy, can be achieved by nodes using cooperative transmission. This dissertation extends the current body of knowledge by providing a comprehensive study of the energy efficiency of two-source cooperative transmission under differing assumptions about channel state knowledge, cooperative protocol, and node selfishness. The first part of this dissertation analyzes the effect of channel state information on the optimum energy allocation and energy efficiency of a simple cooperative transmission protocol called orthogonal amplify-and-forward (OAF). The source nodes are required to achieve a quality-of service (QoS) constraint, e.g. signal to noise ratio or outage probability, at the destination. Since a QoS constraint does not specify a unique transmit energy allocation when the nodes use OAF cooperative transmission, minimum total energy strategies are provided for both short-term and long-term QoS constraints. For independent Rayleigh fading channels, full knowledge of the channel state at both of the sources and at the destination is shown to significantly improve the energy efficiency of OAF cooperative transmission as well as direct (non-cooperative) transmission. The results also demonstrate how channel state knowledge affects the minimum total energy allocation strategy. Under identical channel state knowledge assumptions, the results demonstrate that OAF cooperative transmission tends to have better energy efficiency than direct transmission over a wide range of channel conditions. The second part of this dissertation focuses on the development of an opportunistic hybrid cooperative transmission protocol that achieves increased energy efficiency by not only optimizing the resource allocation but also by selecting the most energy efficient cooperative transmission protocol from a set of available protocols according to the current channel state. The protocols considered in the development of the hybrid cooperative transmission protocol include compress-and-forward (CF), estimate-and-forward (EF), non-orthogonal amplify-and-forward (NAF), and decode-and-forward (DF). Instantaneous capacity results are analyzed under the assumption of full channel state knowledge at both of the sources and the destination node. Numerical results are presented showing that the delay limited capacity and outage probability of the hybrid cooperative transmission protocol are superior to that of any single protocol and are also close to the cut-set bound over a wide range of channel conditions. The final part of this dissertation focuses on the issue of node selfishness in cooperative transmission. It is common to assume in networks with a central authority, e.g. military networks, that nodes will always be willing to offer help to other nodes when requested to do so. This assumption may not be valid in ad hoc networks operating without a central authority. This section of the dissertation considers the effect selfish behavior on the energy efficiency of cooperative communication systems. Using tools from non-cooperative game theory, a two-player relaying game is formulated and analyzed in non-fading and fading channel scenarios. In non-fading channels, it is shown that a cooperative equilibrium can exist between two self-interested sources given that the end of the cooperative interaction is uncertain, that the sources can achieve mutual benefit through cooperation, and that the sources are sufficiently patient in the sense that they value future payoffs. In fading channels, a cooperative conditional trigger strategy is proposed and shown to be an equilibrium of the two-player game. Sources following this strategy are shown to achieve an energy efficiency very close to that of a centrally-controlled system when they are sufficiently patient. The results in this section show that cooperation can often be established between two purely self-interested sources without the development of extrinsic incentive mechanisms like virtual currency