Distributed space-time-coded protocols for exploiting cooperative diversity in wireless networks

We develop and analyze space-time coded cooperative diversity protocols for combating multipath fading across multiple protocol layers in a wireless network. The protocols exploit spatial diversity available among a collection of distributed terminals that relay messages for one another in such a manner that the destination terminal can average the fading, even though it is unknown a priori which terminals will be involved. In particular, a source initiates transmission to its destination, and many relays potentially receive the transmission. Those terminals that can fully decode the transmission utilize a space-time code to cooperatively relay to the destination. We demonstrate that these protocols achieve full spatial diversity in the number of cooperating terminals, not just the number of decoding relays, and can be used effectively for higher spectral efficiencies than repetition-based schemes. We discuss issues related to space-time code design for these protocols, emphasizing codes that readily allow for appealing distributed versions.     

Diversity order of decode-and-forward MIMO relaying with transmit antenna selection

This article analyzes the diversity order of several proposed schemes, where the transmit antenna selection (TAS) strategies are combined with low-complexity decode-and-forward (DF) protocols in the multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relaying scenario. Although antenna selection is a suboptimal form of beamforming, it enjoys the advantages of tractable optimization and low feedback overhead. Specifically, this article proposes schemes that combine TAS strategies with fixed decode-and-forward (FDF) and selection decode-and-forward (SDF) protocols. Following that, the asymptotic expressions of outage probabilities are derived and the diversity order of the proposed schemes analyzed. These kinds of combination of transmit antenna selection strategies and low-complexity decode-and-forward protocols can achieve partial diversity order in the MIMO relaying scenario. The numerical simulations verify the analysis.     

Cooperative Protocols Design for Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks with Multi-hop Routing

Wireless ad-hoc networks can experience significant performance degradation under fading channels. Spatial diversity has been shown to be an effective way of combating wireless fading with the multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technique by transmitting correlated information through multiple antennas. The virtual MIMO technique, which allows multiple wireless stations with single antenna to form a virtual transmission array, is shown to be a viable solution from several recent studies. In this paper, we propose a complete system framework for wireless ad-hoc networks utilizing two different cooperative relaying techniques at the physical layer: the repetition coding and the space-time coding. In the data link layer, two medium access control protocols are proposed to accommodate the corresponding physical layer cooperative diversity schemes. In the network layer, diversity-aware routing protocols are proposed to determine the routing path and the relaying topology. Simulations with both constant bit rate and TCP (transmission control protocol) traffic show significant performance gains of the proposed cooperative relaying schemes.     

协作通信中的解码转发中继策略优化

在单中继协作通信系统模型下,研究了直接传输、固定解码转发（ DF）中继、选择DF中继和增量中继协议。为了提高协作通信系统的频谱效率和中断性能,通过比较源-目的端和中继-目的端的瞬时信道增益来判定是否需要采用协同通信模式,提出一种改进的解码转发方式（ IDF）。通过将选择DF中继和增量中继的优点结合,提出了一种增量选择中继（ ISR）策略,并给出了2种改进协议任意信噪比的中断概率表达式。仿真结果表明,与传统的单中继解码转发协议相比, IDF和ISR均具有更低的中断概率, ISR具有最低的中断概率。     

Fading relay channels: performance limits and space-time signal design

Cooperative diversity is a transmission technique, where multiple terminals pool their resources to form a virtual antenna array that realizes spatial diversity gain in a distributed fashion. In this paper, we examine the basic building block of cooperative diversity systems, a simple fading relay channel where the source, destination, and relay terminals are each equipped with single antenna transceivers. We consider three different time-division multiple-access-based cooperative protocols that vary the degree of broadcasting and receive collision. The relay terminal operates in either the amplify-and-forward (AF) or decode-and-forward (DF) modes. For each protocol, we study the ergodic and outage capacity behavior (assuming Gaussian code books) under the AF and DF modes of relaying. We analyze the spatial diversity performance of the various protocols and find that full spatial diversity (second-order in this case) is achieved by certain protocols provided that appropriate power control is employed. Our analysis unifies previous results reported in the literature and establishes the superiority (both from a capacity, as well as a diversity point-of-view) of a new protocol proposed in this paper. The second part of the paper is devoted to (distributed) space-time code design for fading relay channels operating in the AF mode. We show that the corresponding code design criteria consist of the traditional rank and determinant criteria for the case of colocated antennas, as well as appropriate power control rules. Consequently space-time codes designed for the case of colocated multiantenna channels can be used to realize cooperative diversity provided that appropriate power control is employed.     

A closed-form expression for the outage probability of decode-and-forward relaying in dissimilar Rayleigh fading channels

Decode-and-forward relaying has been shown to be a viable transmission protocol for wireless networks incorporating distributed spatial diversity. Practical systems may employ relay channels that experience statistically different signal fading. The performance of decode-and-forward relaying in channels with dissimilar fading parameters is investigated. In particular, a closed-form expression for the outage probability of a system with an arbitrary number of relays is derived     

Energy efficiency of some non-cooperative, cooperative and hybrid communication schemes in multi-relay WSNs

In this paper we analyze the energy efficiency of single-hop, multi-hop, cooperative selective decode-and-forward, cooperative incremental decode-and-forward, and even the combination of cooperative and non-cooperative schemes, in wireless sensor networks composed of several nodes. We assume that, as the sensor nodes can experience either non line-of-sight or some line-of-sight conditions, the Nakagami-m fading distribution is used to model the wireless environment. The energy efficiency analysis is constrained by a target outage probability and an end-to-end throughput. Our results show that in most scenarios cooperative incremental schemes are more energy efficient than the other methods.     

Power allocation in a transmit diversity system with mean channel gain information

We study the power allocation problem in a transmit diversity wireless system with mean channel gain information. In Rayleigh fading for a given set of mean channel gains and nodes, we seek to find the power allocation that minimizes the outage probability subject to a total power constraint. The optimal solution is shown to be computationally intensive when the number of channels is large. Instead, we derive a simple solution based on the upper bound to the outage probability which can be summarized as equal power allocation with channel selection. Numerical results show that the proposed solution is near-optimal over a wide range of parameter values. The problem addressed and the solution are relevant to a decode-and-forward cooperative relaying system with only partial channel information available to the relays.     

Asymptotic analysis of amplify-and-forward relaying in Nakagami-fading environments

Amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying strategies are studied for Nakagami-fading channels in an (N + 2)-terminal wireless cooperative system where a source terminal transmits information to a destination terminal with the assistance of N relay terminals. The asymptotic outage behavior is investigated in terms of coding and diversity gains for channel-state information (CSI)-assisted AF relaying and semi-blind AF relaying in various channel profiles. It is shown that semi-blind AF relaying system achieves strictly higher average SNRs. Further, when there exists fading severity difference between the source-to-relay and relay-to-destination links, both AF strategies achieve the same diversity gain whereas semi-blind AF achieves strictly lower coding.     

Cooperative Fading Regions for Decode and Forward Relaying

Cooperative transmission protocols over fading channels are based on a number of relaying nodes to form virtual multi-antenna transmissions. Diversity provided by these techniques has been widely analyzed for the Rayleigh fading case. However, short range or fixed wireless communications often experience propagation environments where the fading envelope distribution is meaningfully different from Rayleigh. The main focus in this paper is to investigate the impact of fading distribution on performances of collaborative communication. Cooperative protocols are compared to co-located multi-antenna systems by introducing the concept of cooperative fading region. This is the collection of fading distributions for which relayed transmission can be regarded as a competitive option (in terms of performances) compared to multi-antenna direct (noncooperative) transmission. The analysis is dealt with by adopting the information theoretic outage probability as the performance metric. Cooperative link performances at high SNR are conveniently expressed here in terms of diversity and coding gain as outage parameters that are provided by the fading statistics of the channels involved in collaborative transmission. Advantages of cooperative transmission compared to multi-antenna are related to the propagation environment so that the analysis can be used in network design.      

Relaying protocols for two colocated users

We consider a wireless network where a remote source sends information to one of two colocated users, and where the second user can serve as a relay. The source's transmission is subjected to quasi-static flat Rayleigh fading, while the transmission of the relay experiences a fixed amplitude gain with a uniform random phase, capturing its close proximity to the destination. All communications share the same time/bandwith resources, and perfect channel state information is known only to the receivers. We propose relaying protocols which are based on Wyner-Ziv quantization at the relay, and demonstrate their high efficiency (in terms of expected throughput) with respect to previously reported relaying schemes based on amplify-and-forward and decode-and-forward. A salient feature of these protocols is that the relay need not know the actual fading gain experienced by the destination in order to perform the quantization. We also consider a hybrid amplify-quantize-decode-and-forward scheme which exhibits superior performance.     

Nakagami-m信道下全双工解码转发中继中断概率分析

研究存在残余自干扰（residual self-interference, RSI）条件下全双工解码转发中继的中断概率性能。在Nakagami-m信道下,推导了多跳解码转发（multi-hop decode-and-forward,MH-DF）策略和选择解码转发（selected decode-and-forward,SDF）策略的端到端中断概率闭合表达式和渐近表达式,分析了两种策略的可达分集度。结果显示,MH-DF策略的可达分集度为0,SDF策略的可达分集度由信道成型因子和中继功率伸缩方案决定。相比于MH-DF策略,SDF策略具有更优的中断概率性能和抗自干扰能力。      

Performance analysis of amplify-and-forward relaying with hybrid-ARQ in Rayleigh fading channels

Hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) is a well-known technique for improving system throughput and link performance of wireless communication systems, including cooperative communication systems. The amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying method is one of the most attractive cooperative diversity schemes because of its low complexity. In this article, the end-to-end performance in terms of block error rate (BLER) and normalized throughput of AF relaying with HARQ transmission under the Rayleigh fading channel is analyzed. Numerical results validate the proposed analysis and demonstrate the gain of HARQ schemes in AF relaying systems. This analytical method can be extended to the systems with other HARQ protocols and other cooperative relaying schemes.     

时间空间联合频谱检测认知协作分集系统的中断概率分析

无线网络中利用协作分集技术可显著提高传输性能。认知无线网络中采用时间空间联合频谱检测能更充分地利用主用户的空闲频谱空洞。本文对采用时间空间联合频谱检测的认知协作分集系统的中断概率性能进行分析,给出采用选择解码转发中继协议时在瑞利衰落信道下的准确中断概率闭合式。分析和仿真结果表明:采用时间空间联合频谱检测的系统的中断概率性能优于单独时间频谱检测和单独空间频谱检测的系统,而协作分集技术的引入也明显改善了认知用户的传输性能。中断概率的理论结果对于衡量和评估认知网络的频谱检测方案、协作传输方案的性能有重要的理论和实用价值。      

Nakagami衰落信道下多跳合作分集系统的中断率

该文在Nakagami衰落信道下研究了多跳无线网络中合作分集系统的中断性能。根据单节点和多节点中继的情况导出了合作系统再生中继时中断率的数学闭式解,并在高平均信噪比下给出了系统的分集度。理论分析和仿真研究的结果表明多跳合作系统在一定条件下可实现全路由分集,其分集度为所有路由的分集度之和,不是所有合作节点的和,但每支路由的分集度取决于该路由两跳中较小的值。     

Outage Performance of OFDM-Based Selective Decode-and-Forward Cooperative Networks Over Nakagami-<Emphasis Type="Italic">m</Emphasis> Fading Channels

In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of OFDM-based selective decode-and-forward cooperative networks over independent but not necessarily identically distributed (i.n.i.d.) Nakagami-m fading channels, with integer values of parameter m. A unified closed-form expression for the outage probability is derived for three selective relaying schemes. The effect of the coherence bandwidth on the proposed scheme is also investigated. Monte Carlo simulations are carried out to validate our analysis.     

Cooperative multiple relay system for frequency selective environment: outage analysis and power allocation

In this paper, we propose a novel cooperative relaying scheme with multiple relays for frequency selective wireless environment. In our proposed scheme, the frequency selective wireless channel is divided into flat fading sub‐channels. Cooperative relaying is then employed over each sub‐channel to improve the system diversity order. We then investigate the asymptotic behavior of the outage probability and show that the proposed scheme achieves full diversity order in both amplify and forward (AF) and adaptive decode and forward (ADF) relaying scenarios. Furthermore, we propose a power allocation strategy to minimize the system outage probability. Simulation results confirm our analysis and show that the proposed power allocation method outperforms uniform power allocation. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Nakagami信道下MIMO解码转发中继系统的安全性能分析

在协同自适应解码转发中继系统中,该文针对Nakagami-m衰落信道,研究了基于多天线低复杂度的机会式传输策略的物理层安全性能。为充分利用天线分集增益提升系统安全性能,发送节点均采用发送天线选择策略,接收节点均采用最大比合并策略。推导了系统安全中断概率的闭合表达式,并进一步提供了渐近性能分析,得到了系统的安全分集阶数。仿真结果验证了理论分析的正确性,并揭示了各系统参数对机会式传输方案的安全性能的影响。结果表明,通过增加合法节点的天线数和增大合法信道的Nakagami衰落信道参数可显著提升系统安全性能。     

Differential Relay Strategies Over Downlink Channel in Two-User Cooperative Communication System

In this paper, we propose two differential relaying strategies; Active User Strategy (AUS) and Passive Users Relaying Strategy (PURS), which could be used by the base-station to transmit data of two users over downlink channels in a two-user cooperative communication network. Differential schemes are used so the users do not require the knowledge of channel gains for decoding of their data. The performance of both schemes is evaluated for the decode-and-forward, selection relaying, and incremental relaying protocols. For the decode-and-forward protocol, the performance heavily depends upon the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the link between source and relay. We propose a conditional probability of error based approach, which can be used to regulate the erroneous relaying of data. Both AUS and PURS are able to achieve performance gains as compared to the direct transmission differential scheme in the case of selection relaying and incremental relaying protocols at high SNRs. The proposed schemes perform better than their counterpart of the amplify-and-forward differential relaying proposed previously.     

Differential modulation for two-user cooperative diversity systems

This paper introduces a novel differential modulation scheme for a two-user cooperative diversity system which does not require channel state information at either the users or the destination. The performance of fixed decode-and-forward and selection relaying protocols is evaluated in both symmetric and asymmetric interuser-channel cases. The lower bound on the performance of the decode-and-forward protocol is given, while the exact bit-error probability of the selection relaying protocol is thoroughly derived. The decode-and-forward relaying protocol achieves a performance gain when the signal-to-noise ratios in the interuser channels are symmetric and sufficiently high. The selection relaying protocol shows a larger performance gain and does not exhibit an error floor like in the case of the decode-and-forward protocol. In addition, it is robust to the asymmetric interuser channels.