Multiaccess fading channels. II. Delay-limited capacities

For pt.I see ibid., vol.44, no.7, p.2796-815 (1998). In multiaccess wireless systems, dynamic allocation of resources such as transmit power, bandwidths, and rates is an important means to deal with the time-varying nature of the environment. We consider the problem of optimal resource allocation from an information-theoretic point of view. We focus on the multiaccess fading channel with Gaussian noise, and define two notions of capacity depending on whether the traffic is delay-sensitive or not. In the present paper, we introduce a notion of delay-limited capacity which is the maximum rate achievable with delay independent of how slow the fading is. We characterize the delay-limited capacity region of the multiaccess fading channel and the associated optimal resource allocation schemes. We show that successive decoding is optimal, and the optimal decoding order and power allocation can be found explicitly as a function of the fading states; this is a consequence of an underlying polymatroid structure that we exploit     

Outage capacities and optimal power allocation for fading multiple-access channels

We derive the outage capacity region of an M-user fading multiple-access channel (MAC) under the assumption that both the transmitters and the receiver have perfect channel side information (CSI). The outage capacity region is implicitly obtained by deriving the outage probability region for a given rate vector. Given a required rate and average power constraint for each user, we find a successive decoding strategy and a power allocation policy that achieves points on the boundary of the outage probability region. We discuss the scenario where an outage must be declared simultaneously for all users (common outage) and when outages can be declared individually (individual outage) for each user.     

Information-theoretic considerations for symmetric, cellular,multiple-access fading channels. I

A simple idealized linear (and planar) uplink cellular multiple-access communication model, where only adjacent cell interference is present and all signals may experience fading, is considered. Shannon theoretic arguments are invoked to gain insight into the implications on performance of the main system parameters and multiple-access techniques. We specialize to the linear model and address the case of practical importance where the cell-site receiver processes only the signals received at this cell site, and where the actively interfering users assigned to other cells (but not those within the cell) are interpreted as Gaussian noise (worst case assumption). We assume that the cell-site receiver is aware of the instantaneous signal-to-noise ratios for all users assigned to that cell while the users' transmitters do not have access to this side information. We first investigate several different scenarios and focus on the effect of fading and intercell interference and then provide a general formulation for an achievable rate region (inner-bound) of which all the different scenarios are special cases. The features of TDMA and wideband (WB) intracell multiple-access techniques are examined as well as the role of (optimized) fractional intercell time-sharing (ICTS) protocol. The cases of: no fading, fading where intercell interference is not dominant, and fading where intercell interference is present, are discussed     

A robust noncoherent equalizer receiver for fading channels with short memory .I. Basic structure

Traditional equalizers are very sensitive to carrier frequency offsets between the transmitter and receiver. Coherent receivers with frequency estimation algorithms can remove the offset to prevent the equalizer breakdown, but with a penalty in receiver complexity. On the other hand, noncoherent receivers such as differential detectors are inherently robust to the frequency offsets but cannot employ standard equalization techniques due to their nonlinear front-end. We introduce a simple noncoherent equalizer receiver structure for fading channel environments with short memory (up to two-bit intervals). The receiver consists of a whitened matched filter followed by a differential detector and a maximum likelihood sequence estimation (MLSE) equalizer. We examine the performance of this noncoherent equalizer by both analysis and simulation. It is shown that despite the simplicity, this receiver structure is capable of significant performance improvement as compared to an ordinary differential detector while operating with receiver frequency offsets two orders of magnitude greater than a traditional MLSE equalizer. This structure offers an attractive solution for high-bit-rate cordless transmission systems such as Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT) that use simple noncoherent receivers whose performance can be constrained by channel dispersion. Using DECT as a case study, we show that the equalizer's performance limits are caused by the receiver nonlinearity and can be improved by adaptation of this nonlinearity to channel conditions.     

Markov error structure for throughput analysis of adaptive modulation systems combined with ARQ over correlated fading channels

We introduce an analytical method that uses a finite-state Markov chain (FSMC) as an error model, for estimating the performance of adaptive modulation systems (AMSs) combined with automatic repeat request (ARQ) schemes in correlated slow fading channels. For the throughput performance evaluation of wireless packet networks, conventionally, we have assumed independent block fading, which may also be suitable to represent fast fading channels. However, in slow fading channels, error rates of consecutive packets are highly correlated and we cannot simply assume independent error structure in performance evaluations. We propose a multistate Markov error structure for AMS in correlated fading channels, which is also described by a finite-state Markov chain (FSMC) and we also present throughput-estimation methods for AMS combined with ARQ, using the proposed Markov error structure.     

Capacity and optimal resource allocation for fading broadcastchannels .I. Ergodic capacity

In multiuser wireless systems, dynamic resource allocation between users and over time significantly improves efficiency and performance. In this two-part paper, we study three types of capacity regions for fading broadcast channels and obtain their corresponding optimal resource allocation strategies: the ergodic (Shannon) capacity region, the zero-outage capacity region, and the outage capacity region with nonzero outage. We derive the ergodic capacity region of an M-user fading broadcast channel for code division (CD), time division (TD), and frequency division (FD), assuming that both the transmitter and the receivers have perfect channel side information (CSI). It is shown that by allowing dynamic resource allocation, TD, FD, and CD without successive decoding have the same ergodic capacity region, while optimal CD has a larger region. Optimal resource allocation policies are obtained for these different spectrum-sharing techniques. A simple suboptimal policy is also proposed for TD and CD without successive decoding that results in a rate region quite close to the ergodic capacity region. Numerical results are provided for different fading broadcast channels     

Service outage based power and rate allocation for parallel fading channels

The service outage based allocation problem explores variable-rate transmission schemes and combines the concepts of ergodic capacity and outage capacity for fading channels. A service outage occurs when the transmission rate is below a given basic rate r/sub o/. The allocation problem is to maximize the expected rate subject to the average power constraint and the constraint that the outage probability is less than /spl epsi/. A general class of probabilistic power allocation schemes is considered for an M-parallel fading channel model. The optimum power allocation scheme is derived and shown to be deterministic except at channel states of a boundary set. The resulting service outage achievable rate ranges from 1-/spl epsi/ of the outage capacity up to the ergodic capacity with increasing average power. Two near-optimum schemes are also derived by exploiting the fact that the outage probability is usually small. The second near-optimum scheme significantly reduces the computational complexity of the optimum solution; moreover, it has a simple structure for the implementation of transmission of mixed real-time and non-real-time services.     

Power allocation for bidirectional AF relaying over rayleigh fading channels

This letter presents two novel power allocation schemes for bidirectional amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying over Rayleigh fading channels through the exploitation of channel mean strength. The first scheme aims to maximize the upper bound of average sum rate, and the other aims to achieve the trade-off of outage probability between two terminals. Numerical results show considerable performance improvement in comparison with conventional power allocation approaches.     

Rayleigh fading channels in mobile digital communication systems.I. Characterization

The paper addresses Rayleigh fading, primarily in the UHF band, that affects mobile systems such as cellular and personal communication systems (PCS). The paper itemizes the fundamental fading manifestations and types of degradation. Two types of fading, large-scale and small-scale, are described. Two manifestations of small-scale fading (signal dispersion and fading rapidity) are examined, and the examination involves two aspects: time and frequency. Two degradation categories are defined for dispersion: frequency selective fading and flat fading. Two degradation categories are defined for fading rapidity: fast and slow. A mathematical model using correlation and power density functions is presented. This model yields a symmetry to help view the Fourier transform and duality relationships that describe the fading phenomena     

Capacity and optimal power allocation for fading broadcast channels with minimum rates

We derive the capacity region and optimal power allocation scheme for a slowly fading broadcast channel in which minimum rates must be maintained for each user in all fading states, assuming perfect channel state information at the transmitter and at all receivers. We show that the minimum-rate capacity region can be written in terms of the ergodic capacity region of a broadcast channel with an effective noise determined by the minimum rate requirements. This allows us to characterize the optimal power allocation schemes for minimum-rate capacity in terms of the optimal power allocations schemes that maximize ergodic capacity of the broadcast channel with effective noise. Numerical results are provided for different fading broadcast channel models.     

Rayleigh fading channels in mobile digital communication systems.I. Characterization

When the mechanisms of fading channels were first modeled in the 1950s and 1960s, the ideas were primarily applied to over-the-horizon communications covering a wide range of frequency bands. The 3-30 MHz high-frequency (HF) band is used for ionospheric communications, and the 300 MHz-3 GHz ultra-high-frequency (UHF) and 3-30 GHz super-high-frequency (SHF) bands are used for tropospheric scatter. Although the fading effects in a mobile radio system are somewhat different than those in ionospheric and tropospheric channels, the early models are still quite useful to help characterize fading effects in mobile digital communication systems. This tutorial addresses Rayleigh fading primarily in the UHF band. That affects mobile systems such as cellular and personal communication systems (PCS). Part I of the tutorial itemizes the fundamental fading manifestations and types of degradation     

Impact of Doppler spread and adaptive modulation on TCP throughput in Rayleigh fading channels

A number of wireless systems have recently adopted adaptive modulation (AM) schemes to improve its efficiency. In this letter, our aim is to study the impact Doppler spread and adaptive modulation has on transmission control protocol (TCP) throughput in Rayleigh fading channels. We consider a finite state Markov channel (FSMC) model, which is a useful model for analyzing radio channel with nonindependent fading. Furthermore, we use a Markov model for TCP evolution and evaluate the TCP performance by computer simulations. In our simulations we have compared the TCP Reno scheme with TCP Tahoe scheme. The results indicate that a large Doppler spread leads to lower TCP throughput due to more frequent transitions of channel states and modulation schemes which make it difficult for the TCP congestion control mechanism to accommodate the dynamic link characteristics.     

A robust receiver structure for time-varying, frequency-flat,Rayleigh fading channels

A receiver structure for unknown time-varying, frequency-flat, Rayleigh fading channels is proposed. Unlike the maximum-likelihood receiver structure, this receiver does not need any knowledge of the channel autocovariance or the received signal-to-noise ratio, and yet analytic and simulation results show, that its bit-error rate performance is close to the optimal structure. The receiver is applicable to signals with constant or approximately constant envelopes or to linearly modulated signals using Nyquist pulses     

Turbo-coded ARQ schemes for DS-CDMA data networks over fading andshadowing channels: throughput, delay, and energy efficiency

Modified ARQ (automatic-repeat-request) techniques based on turbo coding are investigated for asynchronous DS-CDMA (direct-sequence code-division multiple-access) data networks under shadowing and frequency selective fading channel conditions. The throughput, delay, and energy efficiency performance of standard ARQ, metric combining, and RCPT (rate compatible punctured turbo) coded ARQ schemes are compared via simulations. The RCPT/ARQ schemes are shown to outperform the other two schemes in terms of both throughput and energy efficiency at the cost of larger delay and complexity. In addition, maximum network throughput is investigated for different ARQ schemes under energy constraints     

Impact of diversity reception on fading channels with codedmodulation. I. Coherent detection

We address the problem of designing and analyzing the performance of a coded modulation scheme for the fading channel when space diversity is used. Under fairly general conditions, a channel affected by fading can be turned into an additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel by increasing the number of diversity branches. Consequently, it can be expected (and is indeed verified by our analyses and simulations) that a coded modulation scheme designed to be optimal for the AWGN channel also will perform asymptotically well on a fading channel with diversity. This paper presents bounds on the bit-error probability of a system with coded modulation and diversity for space- and time-correlated Rician flat fading. Specifically, we derive a new method which allows evaluation of the pairwise error probability extremely easily, as well as accurately and computationally fast. The accuracy achieved improves considerably on the widely used, but rather loose Chernoff bound. Starting from this analysis, we study the asymptotic behavior of the fading channel with diversity as the number of diversity branches increases, and we address the effects of diversity on coded modulation performance and design criteria, including the effect on interleaver depth (which affects the total delay of the system)     

Unified spatial diversity combining and power allocation for CDMAsystems in multiple time-scale fading channels

In a mobile wireless system, fading effects can be classified into large-scale (long-term) effects and small-scale (short-term) effects. We use transmission power control to compensate for large-scale fading and exploit receiver antenna (space) diversity to combat small-scale fading. We show that the interferences across the antennas are jointly Gaussian in a large system, and then characterize the signal-to-interference ratio for both independent and correlated (across the antennas) small-scale fading cases. Our results show that when each user's small-scale fading effects are independent across the antennas, there is a clear separation between the gains of transmission power control and diversity combining, and the two gains are additive (in decibels). When each user's small-scale fading effects are correlated across the antennas, we observe that, in general, the gains of transmission power control and diversity combining are coupled. However, when the noise level diminishes to zero, using maximum ratio combining “decouples” the gains and achieves the same diversity gain as in the independent case. We then characterize the Pareto-optimal (minimum) transmission power allocation for the cases of perfect and noisy knowledge of the desired user's large-scale fading effects. We find that using antenna diversity leads to significant gains for the transmission power     

Power‐efficient resource allocation with QoS guarantees for TDMA fading channels

This paper proposes two power‐efficient resource allocation policies with statistical delay Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees for uplink time‐division multiple access (TDMA) communication links. Specifically, the first policy aims at maximizing the system throughput while fulfilling the delay QoS and average power constraints, and the second policy is devised as an effort to minimize the total average power subject to individual delay QoS constraints. Convex optimization problems associated with the resource allocation policies are formulated based on a cross‐layer framework, where the queue at the data link layer is served by the resource allocation policy. By employing the Lagrangian duality theory and the dual decomposition theory, two subgradient iteration algorithms are developed to obtain the globally optimal solutions. The aforementioned resource allocation policies have been shown to be deterministic functions of delay QoS requirements and channel fading states. Moreover, numerical results are provided to demonstrate the performance of the proposed resource allocation policies. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Information-theoretic considerations for symmetric, cellular,multiple-access fading channels. II

For pt.I see ibid., vol.43, no.6, p.1877-94 (1997). A simple idealized linear (and planar) uplink, cellular, multiple-access communication model, where only adjacent cell interference is present and all signals may experience fading is considered. Shannon theoretic arguments are invoked to gain insight into the implications on performance of the main system parameters and multiple-access techniques. The model treated in Part I (Shamai, 1997) is extended here to account for cell-site receivers that may process also the received signal at an adjacent cell site, compromising thus between the advantage of incorporating additional information from other cell sites on one hand and the associated excess processing complexity on the other. Various settings which include fading, time-division multiple access (TDMA), wideband (WB), and (optimized) fractional inter-cell time sharing (ICTS) protocols are investigated and compared. In this case and for the WB approach and a large number of users per cell it is found, surprisingly, that fading may enhance performance in terms of Shannon theoretic achievable rates. The linear model is extended to account for general linear and planar configurations. The effect of a random number of users per cell is investigated and it is demonstrated that randomization is beneficial. Certain aspects of diversity as well as some features of TDMA and orthogonal code-division multiple access (CDMA) techniques in the presence of fading are studied in an isolated cell scenario     

Capacity of multiple-antenna fading channels: spatial fading correlation, double scattering, and keyhole

The capacity of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless channels is limited by both the spatial fading correlation and rank deficiency of the channel. While spatial fading correlation reduces the diversity gains, rank deficiency due to double scattering or keyhole effects decreases the spatial multiplexing gains of multiple-antenna channels. In this paper, taking into account realistic propagation environments in the presence of spatial fading correlation, double scattering, and keyhole effects, we analyze the ergodic (or mean) MIMO capacity for an arbitrary finite number of transmit and receive antennas. We assume that the channel is unknown at the transmitter and perfectly known at the receiver so that equal power is allocated to each of the transmit antennas. Using some statistical properties of complex random matrices such as Gaussian matrices, Wishart (1928) matrices, and quadratic forms in the Gaussian matrix, we present a closed-form expression for the ergodic capacity of independent Rayleigh-fading MIMO channels and a tight upper bound for spatially correlated/double scattering MIMO channels. We also derive a closed-form capacity formula for keyhole MIMO channels. This analytic formula explicitly shows that the use of multiple antennas in keyhole channels only offers the diversity advantage, but provides no spatial multiplexing gains. Numerical results demonstrate the accuracy of our analytical expressions and the tightness of upper bounds.