Recent Advances in Joint Wireless Energy and Information Transfer

In this paper, we provide an overview of the recent advances in microwave-enabled wireless energy transfer (WET) technologies and their applications in wireless communications. Specifically, we divide our discussions into three parts. First, we introduce the state-of-the-art WET technologies and the signal processing techniques to maximize the energy transfer efficiency. Then, we discuss an interesting paradigm named simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT), where energy and information are jointly transmitted using the same radio waveform. At last, we review the recent progress in wireless powered communication networks (WPCN), where wireless devices communicate using the power harvested by means of WET. Extensions and future directions are also discussed in each of these areas.Comment: Conference submission accepted by ITW 201

Energy Harvesting Wireless Communications: A Review of Recent Advances

This article summarizes recent contributions in the broad area of energy harvesting wireless communications. In particular, we provide the current state of the art for wireless networks composed of energy harvesting nodes, starting from the information-theoretic performance limits to transmission scheduling policies and resource allocation, medium access and networking issues. The emerging related area of energy transfer for self-sustaining energy harvesting wireless networks is considered in detail covering both energy cooperation aspects and simultaneous energy and information transfer. Various potential models with energy harvesting nodes at different network scales are reviewed as well as models for energy consumption at the nodes.Comment: To appear in the IEEE Journal of Selected Areas in Communications (Special Issue: Wireless Communications Powered by Energy Harvesting and Wireless Energy Transfer

Wireless information and power transfer: from scientific hypothesis to engineering practice

Recently, there has been substantial research interest in the subject of Simultaneous Wireless Information andPower Transfer (SWIPT) owing to its cross-disciplinary appeal and its wide-ranging application potential, whichmotivates this overview. More explicitly, we provide a brief survey of the state-of-the-art and introduce severalpractical transceiver architectures that may facilitate its implementation. Moreover, the most important link-levelas well as system-level design aspects are elaborated on, along with a variety of potential solutions and researchideas. We envision that the dual interpretation of Radio Frequency (RF) signals creates new opportunities as wellas challenges requiring substantial research, innovation and engineering efforts

Throughput Analysis and Optimization of Wireless-Powered Multiple Antenna Full-Duplex Relay Systems

We consider a full-duplex (FD) decode-and-forward system in which the time-switching protocol is employed by the multi-antenna relay to receive energy from the source and transmit information to the destination. The instantaneous throughput is maximized by optimizing receive and transmit beamformers at the relay and the time-split parameter. We study both optimum and suboptimum schemes. The reformulated problem in the optimum scheme achieves closed-form solutions in terms of transmit beamformer for some scenarios. In other scenarios, the optimization problem is formulated as a semi-definite relaxation problem and a rank-one optimum solution is always guaranteed. In the suboptimum schemes, the beamformers are obtained using maximum ratio combining, zero-forcing, and maximum ratio transmission. When beamformers have closed-form solutions, the achievable instantaneous and delay-constrained throughput are analytically characterized. Our results reveal that, beamforming increases both the energy harvesting and loop interference suppression capabilities at the FD relay. Moreover, simulation results demonstrate that the choice of the linear processing scheme as well as the time-split plays a critical role in determining the FD gains.Comment: Accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Communication