Single-Symbol ML Decodable Distributed STBCs for Partially-Coherent Cooperative Networks

TL;DR

This paper establishes conditions for single-symbol decodable distributed space-time block codes in partially-coherent relay channels, expanding design possibilities and showing that phase compensation at relays enhances achievable rates.

Contribution

It derives necessary and sufficient conditions for SSD in distributed STBCs for PCRC and demonstrates how phase compensation increases the rate of SSD codes.

Findings

Identified new conditions for SSD in distributed STBCs.

Showed that phase compensation at relays increases SSD rate to 1/2.

Proved that coordinate interleaving does not affect SSD property.

Abstract

Space-time block codes (STBCs) that are single-symbol decodable (SSD) in a co-located multiple antenna setting need not be SSD in a distributed cooperative communication setting. A relay network with N relays and a single source-destination pair is called a partially-coherent relay channel (PCRC) if the destination has perfect channel state information (CSI) of all the channels and the relays have only the phase information of the source-to-relay channels. In this paper, first, a new set of necessary and sufficient conditions for a STBC to be SSD for co-located multiple antenna communication is obtained. Then, this is extended to a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for a distributed STBC (DSTBC) to be SSD for a PCRC, by identifying the additional conditions. Using this, several SSD DSTBCs for PCRC are identified among the known classes of STBCs. It is proved that even if a SSD STBC for a co-located MIMO channel does not satisfy the additional conditions for the code to be SSD for a PCRC, single-symbol decoding of it in a PCRC gives full-diversity and only coding gain is lost. It is shown that when a DSTBC is SSD for a PCRC, then arbitrary coordinate interleaving of the in-phase and quadrature-phase components of the variables does not disturb its SSD property for PCRC. Finally, it is shown that the possibility of {\em channel phase compensation} operation at the relay nodes using partial CSI at the relays increases the possible rate of SSD DSTBCs from $\frac{2}{N}$ when the relays do not have CSI to 1/2, which is independent of N.