Network-Level Cooperation in Energy Harvesting Wireless Networks

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how energy harvesting constraints affect the stability region of a two-hop wireless network with cooperation at the network level, considering energy limitations at both source and relay nodes.

Contribution

It provides the first analysis of the stability region bounds for a two-hop energy harvesting wireless network with cooperation.

Findings

Inner and outer bounds on the stability region are derived.

Energy harvesting constraints significantly impact network stability.

The results guide design of energy-efficient cooperative wireless networks.

Abstract

We consider a two-hop communication network consisted of a source node, a relay and a destination node in which the source and the relay node have external traffic arrivals. The relay forwards a fraction of the source node's traffic to the destination and the cooperation is performed at the network level. In addition, both source and relay nodes have energy harvesting capabilities and an unlimited battery to store the harvested energy. We study the impact of the energy constraints on the stability region. Specifically, we provide inner and outer bounds on the stability region of the two-hop network with energy harvesting source and relay.