EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking

This paper studies the problem of limited feedback design for heterogeneous multiuser transmissions over time- and frequency-selective (doubly selective) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) downlink channels. In limited feedback design over the channels, the discrete prolate spheroidal basis expansion model (DPS-BEM) is used as a fitting parametric model for capturing the time-variation of the multiuser downlink channels and for reducing the number of the channel parameters. The resulting dimension reduction in the channel representation, in turn, translates into a reduced feedback load of channel state information (CSI) to the base station (BS). To exploit the considerable reduction in CSI feedback load, vector quantization (VQ) of the DPS-BEM coefficients is performed at users under the assumption that perfect BEM coefficient estimation has been established by existing algorithms. The output indices of the quantized BEM coefficient vectors are assumed to be sent to the BS via error-free, zero-latency feedback links. With the quantized CSI, the block-diagonalization (BD) precoding and greedy scheduling techniques are employed for the heterogeneous multiuser transmission (i.e., users with different numbers of receive antennas and different signal-to-noise ratios). Numerical results show that the BEM-based limited feedback scheme is able to significantly alleviate the detrimental effect of outdated CSI feedback over the time-varying channels.

Recently, the capacity region of the MIMO broadcast channel (BC) was completely characterized and duality between MIMO multiple access channel (MAC) and MIMO BC with perfect channel state information (CSI) at transmitter and receiver was established. In this work, we propose a MIMO BC approach in which only information about the channel norm is available at the base and hence no dirty paper precoding (DPC) can be applied. However, a certain set of individual performances in terms of MSE or zero-outage rates can be guaranteed at any time by applying an orthogonal space time block code (OSTBC). The guaranteed MSE region without superposition coding is characterized in closed form and the impact of diversity, fading statistics, and number of transmit antennas is analyzed. The guaranteed MSE region with superposition coding is also studied. Finally, the guaranteed sum MSE is briefly discussed.

Historically developed for secure communication and military use, CDMA is now serving as one of the most widely used wireless airlink interface and has been identified as a major technique for 3G wireless communications. In addition to the wide bandwidth and low power spectrum density which make CDMA signals robust to narrow band jamming and easy to be concealed within the noise floor, the physical layer built-in information privacy of CDMA system is provided by pseudo-random scrambling. In this paper, first, the physical layer security weakness of the operational IS-95 CDMA airlink interface is analyzed. Secondly, based on the advanced encryption standard (AES), we propose to enhance the physical layer built-in security of CDMA systems through secure scrambling. Performance analysis demonstrates that while providing significantly improved information privacy, CDMA system with secure scrambling has comparable computational complexity and system performance with that of the IS-95 system. Moreover, it is shown that by scrambling the training sequence and the message sequence separately with two independent scrambling sequences, both information privacy and system performance can be further improved. The proposed scheme can readily be applied to 3G systems and IEEE 802.11b WLAN systems

For practical wireless DS-CDMA systems, channel estimation is imperfect due to noise and interference. The impact of channel estimation error on multiuser detection (MUD) is analyzed under the framework of the replica method. System performance is obtained in the large system limit for optimal MUD, linear MUD and turbo MUD, and is validated by the numerical results of finite systems.

Although the generation of correlated Rayleigh fading envelopes has been intensively considered in the literature, all conventional methods have their own particular shortcomings, which seriously impedes their applicability. A very general, straightforward algorithm is proposed for the generation of an arbitrary number of Rayleigh envelopes with any desired, equal or unequal power in wireless channels, either with or without Doppler frequency shifts. The proposed algorithm can be applied in the case of spatial correlation, such as with antenna arrays in multiple input multiple output (MIMO) systems, or spectral correlation between random processes, as in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems. It can also be used for generating correlated Rayleigh fading envelopes in either discrete-time instants or a real-time scenario. Besides being more generalized, our proposed algorithm is more precise, while overcoming all the shortcomings of conventional methods.

This paper investigates the properties of social choice functions, that represent resource allocation strategies in interference coupled wireless systems. The resources can be physical layer parameters such as power vectors or antenna weights. The paper investigates the permissible social choice functions, which can be implemented by a mechanism in either Nash equilibria or dominant strategy - for utility functions representing interference coupled wireless systems. Strategy proofness and efficiency properties of social choice functions are used to capture the properties of non-manipulability and Pareto optimality of solution outcomes of resource allocation strategies, respectively. The analysis indicates certain inherent limitations when designing strategy proof and efficient resource allocation strategies. These restrictions are investigated in an analytical mechanism design framework of interference coupled wireless systems. Furthermore, the paper characterizes the Pareto optimal boundary points (efficient) of utility sets of interference coupled wireless system. An axiomatic framework of interference functions is used to capture interference coupling. The Pareto optimal boundary points for the cases of individual power constraints and a total power constraint are described based on the properties of the underlying interference functions.

We introduce the Delay Tolerant Firework Routing (DTFR) protocol, a protocol designed for routing in wireless Delay Tolerant Networks (DTNs) that consist of very large numbers of highly mobile nodes. Under DTFR, each packet initially travels, using high priority transmissions, to a target region in the network where the destination is expected to be. Once there, the packet is replicated to a number of copies that spread across the target region, in search of the destination. As soon as a copy finds a known route to the destination, it follows it and gets delivered. To evaluate DTFR's performance, we have developed a simulation tool that can handle networks with numbers of nodes on the order of 104. The simulation is optimized for use in DTNs and is very detailed, taking into account, among other things, the Media Access sublayer and the contents of buffers. Our protocol is compared against (i) Spray and Wait, (ii) GeoCross, (in) GeoDTN+Nav, (iv) a simple flooding protocol (chosen as one extreme of the design space), and (v) Bethlehem Routing (BR), an idealistic protocol that upper bounds the performance of a wide class of protocols. For a wide range of parameters, our protocol is superior (in terms of packet delay and aggregate throughput) to Spray and Wait, GeoCross, GeoDTN+Nav, and the flooding protocol, and performs close to the Bethlehem upper bound.

The 3D MIMO code is a robust and efficient space-time block code (STBC) for the distributed MIMO broadcasting but suffers from high maximum-likelihood (ML) decoding complexity. In this paper, we first analyze some properties of the 3D MIMO code to show that the 3D MIMO code is fast-decodable. It is proved that the ML decoding performance can be achieved with a complexity of O(M^{4.5}) instead of O(M^8) in quasi static channel with M-ary square QAM modulations. Consequently, we propose a simplified ML decoder exploiting the unique properties of 3D MIMO code. Simulation results show that the proposed simplified ML decoder can achieve much lower processing time latency compared to the classical sphere decoder with Schnorr-Euchner enumeration.

With rapid advancements in sensing, networking, and computing technologies, recent years have witnessed the emergence of cyber-physical systems (CPS) in a broad range of application domains. CPS is a new class of engineered systems that features the integration of computation, communications, and control. In contrast to general-purpose computing systems, many cyber-physical applications are safety-cricial. These applications impose considerable requirements on quality of service (QoS) of the employed networking infrastruture. Since IEEE 802.15.4 has been widely considered as a suitable protocol for CPS over wireless sensor and actuator networks, it is of vital importance to evaluate its performance extensively. Serving for this purpose, this paper will analyze the performance of IEEE 802.15.4 standard operating in different modes respectively. Extensive simulations have been conducted to examine how network QoS will be impacted by some critical parameters. The results are presented and analyzed, which provide some useful insights for network parameter configuration and optimization for CPS design.

Collecting sensor data in industrial environments from up to some tenth of battery powered sensor nodes with sampling rates up to 100Hz requires energy aware protocols, which avoid collisions and long listening phases. The IEEE 802.15.4 standard focuses on energy aware wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and the Task Group 4e has published an amendment to fulfill up to 100 sensor value transmissions per second per sensor node (Low Latency Deterministic Network (LLDN) mode) to satisfy demands of factory automation. To improve the reliability of the data collection in the star topology of the LLDN mode, we propose a relay strategy, which can be performed within the LLDN schedule. Furthermore we propose an extension of the star topology to collect data from two-hop sensor nodes. The proposed Retransmission Mode enables power savings in the sensor node of more than 33%, while reducing the packet loss by up to 50%. To reach this performance, an optimum spatial distribution is necessary, which is discussed in detail.

IEEE 802.16 Wireless Network technology is a hot research issue in recent years. It provides wider coverage of radio and higher speed wireless access, and Quality-of-Service plays an important part in the standard. For mobile multi-hop wireless network, IEEE 802.16j/MR network not only can supply large area wireless deployment, but also can provide high quality network service to mobile users. Although Mobile QoS supporting has been extensively investigated, Mobile QoS supporting in the IEEE 802.16-MR network is relatively unexplored. In this article, the probability of a mobile user who visits a Relay Station (RS) is known beforehand. With the visiting probability at each RS and the system specified size of the range for bandwidth allocation, Base Station (BS) can calculate the required bandwidth to meet the mobile user's demand and allocate appropriate bandwidth for a mobile user roaming in the range of the bandwidth allocation. The range of bandwidth allocation for mobile users is called the Zone in this article, which includes the user's current RS and the nearby RSs. The proposed scheme is therefore called Zone-based bandwidth management scheme. The simulation results demonstrate that Zone-based bandwidth management scheme can reduce QoS degradation and bandwidth re-allocation overhead. 802.16–WiMAX–MR–Mobility–QoS

With the rapid development of wireless communication technology and the rapid increase in demand for network bandwidth, IEEE 802.16e is an emerging network technique that has been deployed in many metropolises. In addition to the features of high data rate and large coverage, it also enables scalable video multicasting, which is a potentially promising application, over an IEEE 802.16e network. How to optimally assign the modulation and coding scheme (MCS) of the scalable video stream for the mobile subscriber stations to improve spectral efficiency and maximize utility is a crucial task. We formulate this MCS assignment problem as an optimization problem, called the total utility maximization problem (TUMP). This article transforms the TUMP into a precedence constraint knapsack problem, which is a NP-complete problem. Then, a branch and bound method, which is based on two dominance rules and a lower bound, is presented to solve the TUMP. The simulation results show that the proposed branch and bound method can find the optimal solution efficiently. Adaptive modulation and coding–Branch and bound algorithm–IEEE 802.16e–Resource allocation–Scalable video coding

A fundamental choice in femtocell deployments is the set of users which are allowed to access each femtocell. Closed access restricts the set to specifically registered users, while open access allows any mobile subscriber to use any femtocell. Which one is preferable depends strongly on the distance between the macrocell base station (MBS) and femtocell. The main results of the paper are lemmas which provide expressions for the SINR distribution for various zones within a cell as a function of this MBS-femto distance. The average sum throughput (or any other SINR-based metric) of home users and cellular users under open and closed access can be readily determined from these expressions. We show that unlike in the uplink, the interests of home and cellular users are in conflict, with home users preferring closed access and cellular users preferring open access. The conflict is most pronounced for femtocells near the cell edge, when there are many cellular users and fewer femtocells. To mitigate this conflict, we propose a middle way which we term shared access in which femtocells allocate an adjustable number of time-slots between home and cellular users such that a specified minimum rate for each can be achieved. The optimal such sharing fraction is derived. Analysis shows that shared access achieves at least the overall throughput of open access while also satisfying rate requirements, while closed access fails for cellular users and open access fails for the home user. Comment: 26 pages, 8 figures, Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications

In this paper, we study the decentralized parallel multiple access channel (MAC) when transmitters selfishly maximize their individual spectral efficiency by selecting a single channel to transmit. More specifically, we investigate the set of Nash equilibria (NE) of decentralized networks comprising several transmitters communicating with a single receiver that implements single user decoding. This scenario is modeled as a one-shot game where the players (the transmitters) have discrete action sets (the channels). We show that the corresponding game has always at least one NE in pure strategies, but, depending on certain parameters, the game might possess several NE. We provide an upper bound for the maximum number of NE as a function of the number of transmitters and available channels. The main contribution of this paper is a mathematical proof of the existence of a Braess-type paradox. In particular, it is shown that under the assumption of a fully loaded network, when transmitters are allowed to use all the available channels, the corresponding sum spectral efficiency achieved at the NE is lower or equal than the sum spectral efficiency achieved when transmitters can use only one channel. A formal proof of this observation is provided in the case of small networks. For general scenarios, we provide numerical examples that show that the same effect holds as long as the network is kept fully loaded. We conclude the paper by considering the case of successive interference cancellation at the receiver. In this context, we show that the power allocation vectors at the NE are capacity maximizers. Finally, simulations are presented to verify our theoretical results.

Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) has been considered for visible light communication (VLC) thanks to its ability to boost data rates as well as its robustness against frequency-selective fading channels. A major disadvantage of OFDM is the large dynamic range of its time-domain waveforms, making OFDM vulnerable to nonlinearity of light emitting diodes (LEDs). DC biased optical OFDM (DCO-OFDM) and asymmetrically clipped optical OFDM (ACO-OFDM) are two popular OFDM techniques developed for the VLC. In this paper, we will analyze the performance of the DCO-OFDM and ACO-OFDM signals in terms of error vector magnitude (EVM), signal-to-distortion ratio (SDR), and achievable data rates under both average optical power and dynamic optical power constraints. EVM is a commonly used metric to characterize distortions. We will describe an approach to numerically calculate the EVM for DCO-OFDM and ACO-OFDM. We will derive the optimum biasing ratio in the sense of minimizing EVM for DCO-OFDM. Additionally, we will formulate the EVM minimization problem as a convex linear optimization problem and obtain an EVM lower bound against which to compare the DCO-OFDM and ACO-OFDM techniques. We will prove that the ACO-OFDM can achieve the lower bound. Average optical power and dynamic optical power are two main constraints in VLC. We will derive the achievable data rates under these two constraints for both additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel and frequency-selective channel. We will compare the performance of DCO-OFDM and ACO-OFDM under different power constraint scenarios.

In multi-user communication from one base station (BS) to multiple users, the problem of minimizing the transmit power to achieve some target guaranteed performance (rates) at users has been well investigated in the literature. Similarly various user selection algorithms have been proposed and analyzed when the BS has to transmit to a subset of the users in the system, mostly for the objective of the sum rate maximization. We study the joint problem of minimizing the transmit power at the BS to achieve specific signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio (SINR) targets at users in conjunction with user scheduling. The general analytical results for the average transmit power required to meet guaranteed performance at the users' side are difficult to obtain even without user selection due to joint optimization required over beamforming vectors and power allocation scalars. We study the transmit power minimization problem with various user selection algorithms, namely semi-orthogonal user selection (SUS), norm-based user selection (NUS) and angle-based user selection (AUS). When the SINR targets to achieve are relatively large, the average minimum transmit power expressions are derived for NUS and SUS for any number of users. For the special case when only two users are selected, similar expressions are further derived for AUS and a performance upper bound which serves to benchmark the performance of other selection schemes. Simulation results performed under various settings indicate that SUS is by far the better user selection criterion.

Several techniques of theoretical digital investigation are presented in the literature but most of them are unsuitable to cope with attacks in wireless networks, especially in Mobile Ad hoc and Sensor Networks (MASNets). In this article, we propose a formal approach for digital investigation of security attacks in wireless networks. We provide a model for describing attack scenarios in a wireless environment, and system and network evidence generated consequently. The use of formal approaches is motivated by the need to avoid ad hoc generation of results that impedes the accuracy of analysis and integrity of investigation. We develop an inference system that integrates the two types of evidence, handles incompleteness and duplication of information in them, and allows possible and provable actions and attack scenarios to be generated. To illustrate the proposal, we consider a case study dealing with the investigation of a remote buffer overflow attack. Digital investigation–Wireless networks–Formal proof–Attack scenarios reconstruction–Network of observation

Utility-based power allocation in wireless ad-hoc networks is inherently nonconvex because of the global coupling induced by the co-channel interference. To tackle this challenge, we first show that the globally optimal point lies on the boundary of the feasible region, which is utilized as a basis to transform the utility maximization problem into an equivalent max-min problem with more structure. By using extended duality theory, penalty multipliers are introduced for penalizing the constraint violations, and the minimum weighted utility maximization problem is then decomposed into subproblems for individual users to devise a distributed stochastic power control algorithm, where each user stochastically adjusts its target utility to improve the total utility by simulated annealing. The proposed distributed power control algorithm can guarantee global optimality at the cost of slow convergence due to simulated annealing involved in the global optimization. The geometric cooling scheme and suitable penalty parameters are used to improve the convergence rate. Next, by integrating the stochastic power control approach with the back-pressure algorithm, we develop a joint scheduling and power allocation policy to stabilize the queueing systems. Finally, we generalize the above distributed power control algorithms to multicast communications, and show their global optimality for multicast traffic.

High speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) has been successfully applied in commercial systems and improves user experience significantly. However, it incurs substantial energy consumption. In this paper, we address this issue by proposing a novel energy efficient semi-static power control and link adaptation scheme in HSDPA. Through estimating the EE under different modulation and coding schemes (MCSs) and corresponding transmit power, the proposed scheme can determine the most energy efficient MCS level and transmit power at the Node B. And then the Node B configure the optimal MCS level and transmit power. In order to decrease the signaling overhead caused by the configuration, a dual trigger mechanism is employed. After that, we extend the proposed scheme to the multiple input multiple output (MIMO) scenarios. Simulation results confirm the significant EE improvement of our proposed scheme. Finally, we give a discussion on the potential EE gain and challenge of the energy efficient mode switching between single input multiple output (SIMO) and MIMO configuration in HSDPA.

A downlink adaptive distributed precoding scheme is proposed for coordinated multi-point (CoMP) transmission systems. The serving base station (BS) obtains the optimal precoding vector via user feedback. Meanwhile, the precoding vector of each coordinated BS is determined by adaptive gradient iteration according to the perturbation vector and the adjustment factor based on the vector perturbation method. In each transmission frame, the CoMP user feeds the precoding matrix index back to the serving BS, and feeds back the adjustment factor index to the coordinated BSs, which can reduce the uplink feedback overhead. The selected adjustment factor for each coordinated BS is obtained via the precoding vector of the coordinated BS used in the previous frame and the preferred precoding vector of the serving BS in this frame. The proposed scheme takes advantage of the spatial non-correlation and temporal correlation of the distributed MIMO channel. The design of the adjustment factor set is given and the channel feedback delay is considered. The system performance of the proposed scheme is verified with and without feedback delay respectively and the system feedback overhead is analyzed. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme has a good trade-off between system performance and the system control information overhead on feedback. Coordinated multi-point–Distributed precoding–Limited feedback–Vector perturbation–Adjustment factor

Resource allocation issues are discussed in the context of a virtual multiuser MIMO uplink assuming users equipped with a single antenna. A scheduling algorithm, which efficiently mitigates the co-channel interference (CCI) arising from the spatial correlation of users sharing common resources, is proposed. Users are selected using an incremental approach with a reduced complexity that is due to the elimination of over-correlated users at each iteration. The user selection criterion is based on an adaptive, utility-based scheduling metric designed for the purpose. Its main advantage lies in the periodic adaptation of priority weights according to the application characteristics described with its utility curves and according to momentary quality of service (QoS) parameters. The results show a better performance in aggregate system utility than the existing utility based scheduling metrics such as proportionally fair scheduling (PFS), largest weighted delay first (LWDF), modified LWDF (M-LWDF), and exponential algorithm. Multiuser systems–Adaptive resource allocation–Utility–MIMO–ACM

Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Enhanced Collision Avoidance (CSMA/ECA) is a distributed MAC protocol that allows collision-free access to the medium in WLAN. The only difference between CSMA/ECA and the well-known CSMA/CA is that the former uses a deterministic backoff after successful transmissions. Collision-free operation is reached after a transient state during which some collisions may occur. This article shows that the duration of the transient state can be shortened by appropriately setting the contention parameters. Standard absorbing Markov Chain theory can be used to describe the behaviour of the system in the transient state and to predict the expected number of slots to reach the collision-free operation. The article also introduces CSMA/E2CA, in which a deterministic backoff is used two consecutive times after a successful transmission. CSMA/E2CA converges quicker to collision-free operation and delivers higher performance than CSMA/CA in harsh wireless scenarios with high frame error rates. To achieve collision-free operations when the number of contenders is large, it may be necessary to dynamically adjust the contention parameter. The last part of the article suggests an approach for such parameter adjustment which is validated by simulation results.

This paper deals with the analysis of advanced fade countermeasures for supporting DVB-S2 reception by mobile terminals mounted on high speed trains. Recent market studies indicate this as a potential profitable market for satellite communications, provided that integration with wireless terrestrial networks can be implemented to bridge the satellite connectivity inside railway tunnels and large train stations. In turn, the satellite can typically offer the coverage of around 80% of the railway path with existing space infrastructure. This piece of work, representing the first step of a wider study, is focusing on the modifications which may be required in the DVB-S2 standard (to be employed in the forward link) in order to achieve reliable reception in a challenging environment such as the railway one. Modifications have been devised trying to minimize the impact on the existing air-interface, standardised for fixed terminals.

The time domain inter-cell interference coordination techniques specified in LTE Rel. 10 standard improves the throughput of picocell-edge users by protecting them from macrocell interference. On the other hand, it also degrades the aggregate capacity in macrocell because the macro base station (MBS) does not transmit data during certain subframes known as almost blank subframes. The MBS data transmission using reduced power subframes was standardized in LTE Rel. 11, which can improve the capacity in macrocell while not causing high interference to the nearby picocells. In order to get maximum benefit from the reduced power subframes, setting the key system parameters, such as the amount of power reduction, carries critical importance. Using stochastic geometry, this paper lays down a theoretical foundation for the performance evaluation of heterogeneous networks with reduced power subframes and range expansion bias. The analytic expressions for average capacity and 5th percentile throughput are derived as a function of transmit powers, node densities, and interference coordination parameters in a heterogeneous network scenario, and are validated through Monte Carlo simulations. Joint optimization of range expansion bias, power reduction factor, scheduling thresholds, and duty cycle of reduced power subframes are performed to study the trade-offs between aggregate capacity of a cell and fairness among the users. To validate our analysis, we also compare the stochastic geometry based theoretical results with the real MBS deployment (in the city of London) and the hexagonal-grid model. Our analysis shows that with optimum parameter settings, the LTE Rel. 11 with reduced power subframes can provide substantially better performance than the LTE Rel. 10 with almost blank subframes, in terms of both aggregate capacity and fairness.

Buffer aided relaying has recently attracted a lot of attention due to the improvement in the system throughput. However, a side effect usually deemed is that buffering at relay nodes results in the increase in packet delays. In this paper, we study the effect of buffering relays on the end-to-end delay of users' data, from the time they arrive at source until delivery to the destination. We use simple discussions to provide an insight on the overall waiting time of the packets in the system. By studying the Bernoulli distributed channel conditions, and using intuitive generalizations, we conclude that the use of buffers at relays improves not only throughput, but ironically the end-to-end delay as well. Computer simulations in the settings of practical systems confirm the above results.