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RF energy harvesting in wireless networks with HARQ

In this paper, we consider a class of wireless powered communication networks using data link layer hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) protocol to ensure reliable communications. In particular, we analyze the trade-off between accumulating mutual information and accumulating RF energy at the receiver of a point-to-point link using HARQ with incremental redundancy over a Rayleigh fading channel. The transmitter is assumed to have a constant energy source while the receiver relies, solely, on the RF energy harvested from the received signal. First, we target the optimal time switching (TS)

Software and Communications

The quest for user similarity in mobile societies

In this paper we explore the notion of mobile users' similarity as a key enabler of innovative applications hinging on opportunistic mobile encounters. In particular, we analyze the performance of known similarity metrics, applicable to our problem domain, as well as propose a novel temporal-based metric, in an attempt to quantify the inherently qualitative notion of similarity. Towards this objective, we first introduce generalized profile structures, beyond mere location, that aim to capture users interests and prior experiences, in the form of a probability distribution. Afterwards, we

Software and Communications

Protocol design and stability analysis of cooperative cognitive radio users

A single cognitive radio transmitter-receiver pair shares the spectrum with two primary users communicating with their respective receivers. Each primary user has a local traffic queue, whereas the cognitive user has three queues; one storing its own traffic while the other two are relaying queues used to store primary relayed packets admitted from the two primary users. A new cooperative cognitive medium access control protocol for the described network is proposed, where the cognitive user exploits the idle periods of the primary spectrum bands. Traffic arrival to each relaying queue is

Software and Communications

The relay-eavesdropper channel: Cooperation for secrecy

This paper establishes the utility of user cooperation in facilitating secure wireless communications. In particular, the four-terminal relay-eavesdropper channel is introduced and an outer-bound on the optimal rate-equivocation region is derived. Several cooperation strategies are then devised and the corresponding achievable rate-equivocation region are characterized. Of particular interest is the novel noise-forwarding (NF) strategy, where the relay node sends codewords independent of the source message to confuse the eavesdropper. This strategy is used to illustrate the deaf helper

Software and Communications

The water-filling game in fading multiple-access channels

A game-theoretic framework is developed to design and analyze the resource allocation algorithms in fading multiple-access channels (MACs), where the users are assumed to be selfish, rational, and limited by average power constraints. The maximum sum-rate point on the boundary of the MAC capacity region is shown to be the unique Nash equilibrium of the corresponding water-filling game. This result sheds a new light on the opportunistic communication principle. The base station is then introduced as a player interested in maximizing a weighted sum of the individual rates. A Stackelberg

Software and Communications

Practical provably secure communication for half-duplex radios

In this paper, we present a practical and provably secure two-way wireless communication scheme in the presence of a passive eavesdropper. The scheme implements a randomized scheduling and power allocation mechanism, where each legitimate node transmits in random time slots and with random transmit power. Such randomization results in ambiguity at the eavesdropper with regard to the origin of each transmitted frame. The scheme is analyzed in a time-varying binary block erasure channel model and secrecy outage probabilities are derived and empirically evaluated. The scheme is implemented over

Software and Communications

Opportunistic interference alignment for multiuser cognitive radio

We present an interference alignment (IA) technique that allows multiple opportunistic transmitters (secondary users) to use the same frequency band of a pre-existing primary link without generating any interference. The primary and secondary transmit-receive pairs are equipped with multiple antennas. We exploit the fact that under power constraints on the primary transmitter, the rate of the primary user is maximized by water-filling on the singular values of its channel matrix leaving some eigen modes unused. The secondary users can align their transmitted signals to produce a number of

Software and Communications

Analysis of a device-free passive tracking system in typical wireless environments

Device-free Passive (DfP) localization is a new concept in location determination where the tracked entity does not carry any device nor participate actively in the localization process. A DfP system operates by processing the received physical signal of a wireless transmitter at one or more monitoring points. The previously introduced DfP system was shown to enable the tracking of a single intruder with high accuracy in a highly controlled WLAN environment. In this paper, we propose and analyze different algorithms for DfP tracking in a typical indoor WLAN environment, rich in multipath. We

Software and Communications

Cross-layer minimum-delay scheduling and maximum-throughput resource allocation for multiuser cognitive networks

A cognitive network is considered that consists of a base station (BS) communicating with multiple primary and secondary users. Each secondary user can access only one of the orthogonal primary channels. A model is considered in which the primary users can tolerate a certain average delay. A special case is also considered in which the primary users do not suffer from any delay. A novel cross-layer scheme is proposed in which the BS performs successive interference cancellation and thus a secondary user can coexist with an active primary user without adversely affecting its transmission. A

Software and Communications

The wiretap channel with feedback: Encryption over the channel

In this work, the critical role of noisy feedback in enhancing the secrecy capacity of the wiretap channel is established. Unlike previous works, where a noiseless public discussion channel is used for feedback, the feed-forward and feedback signals share the same noisy channel in the present model. Quite interestingly, this noisy feedback model is shown to be more advantageous in the current setting. More specifically, the discrete memoryless modulo-additive channel with a full-duplex destination node is considered first, and it is shown that the judicious use of feedback increases the

Software and Communications