Capacity Analysis of OFDM Systems with a Swarm of Network-Controlled Repeaters

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the uplink capacity of OFDM systems aided by network-controlled repeaters, showing that a small number of repeaters can significantly boost capacity efficiently.

Contribution

It provides a rigorous capacity formulation for repeater-assisted OFDM channels and demonstrates that activating only the nearest repeater nearly matches full activation performance.

Findings

NCRs can substantially increase system capacity.

Activating only the closest repeater nearly matches activating all.

Using simple activation strategies offers energy savings.

Abstract

This paper investigates the uplink capacity of single-input single-output (SISO) systems assisted by a swarm of network-controlled repeaters (NCRs). We develop a rigorous wideband formulation based on OFDM signaling. Starting from the continuous-time passband model, we derive the capacity expression for the repeater-assisted OFDM channel, accounting for amplified noise contributions from multiple repeaters. Numerical results demonstrate that NCRs can substantially enhance system capacity even with simple activation strategies, and that activating only the closest repeater yields nearly the same performance as activating all repeaters, thereby offering significant energy-saving opportunities. These findings highlight the potential of NCR swarms as a cost-effective and scalable solution for coverage extension and capacity enhancement in wideband wireless networks.