Protocol Design and Performance Analysis of Multiuser Mixed RF and Hybrid FSO/RF Relaying With Buffers

Yasser F. Al-Eryani, Anas Salhab, Salam A. Zummo, Mohamed-Slim Alouini

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

41 Scopus citations

Abstract

In this paper, a multiuser mixed radio frequency (RF) and hybrid free-space optical (FSO)/RF system is considered, where multiple mobile users transmit their data to an intermediate decode-and-forward relay node through RF links using a virtual multiple-input multipleoutput (MIMO) system, and the relay node forwards the multiplexed data of all users through a FSO link that is supported by a RF MIMO backup system to the destination. The relay node is equipped with a buffer in the physical layer for temporal storage of the users' data until the best channel conditions at the relay-destination link aremet. For this communication setup, we first propose a transmission protocol that achieves a multiplexing gain through a virtual MIMO system. After that, we derive closed-form expressions for the end-to-end outage probability, asymptotic outage probability, average symbol error rate, and the ergodic capacity when considering the delay-tolerant (finite buffer size) scenario. The results show that buffering in the physical layer provides a significant enhancement to the system performance (outage, error rate, and ergodic capacity). It is also found that pointing error and severe weather turbulence conditions become more tolerable with the existence of the relay's buffer and RF backup link (in the second hop). In addition, the proposed virtual MIMO scheme shows a significant performance enhancement at a high number of receiving antennas, which introduces potential lowcomplexity diversity gain-based massive MIMO schemes.
Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)309
JournalJournal of Optical Communications and Networking
Volume10
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 8 2018

Bibliographical note

KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01
Acknowledged KAUST grant number(s): KAUST004
Acknowledgements: This work was funded by the National Plan for Science, Technology, and Innovation (Maarifah)-King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology through the Science and Technology Unit at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM), KSA, under grant number 15-ELE4157-04. The work was also supported by the Deanship of Scientific Research in KFUPM through grant number KAUST004. The authors would like also to acknowledge the KFUPM-KAUST research initiative that resulted from this research work.

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