Outage Performance of Opportunistic Decode-and-Forward Cooperation with Imperfect Channel State Information

Abstract

In this paper, the outage probability and diversity order of opportunistic decode-and-forward (DF) cooperation are analyzed under Rayleigh fading channels, where the impacts of channel estimation error, relay selection feedback delay and the availability of the direct link between the source and the destination are considered comprehensively. The closed-form expressions of outage probability in the high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region are derived as well as the diversity order. The theoretical results demonstrate that the achievable diversity order is zero when channel estimation error exists, and this conclusion holds no matter whether the direct link is available, even if the relay selection feedback is delay-free. For the perfect channel estimation scenario, the achievable diversity order is related to the potential relay number K, the channel delay correlation coefficient ρd and the availability of the direct link. If relay selection feedback is not delayed, i.e., ρd = 1, the diversity order is K when the direct link is blocked, and it becomes K + 1 when the direct link is available. For delayed relay selection feedback, i.e., ρd < 1, the diversity order achievable is only related to the availability of the direct link. In this case, if the direct link does not exist, the diversity order is 1, otherwise the diversity order of 2 can be obtained. Simulation results verify the analytical results of outage probability and diversity order.