CSIN-assisted AF dual-hop relaying communication systems over imperfect Nagakami-m fading channels: Exact error performance

Relaying-based communication techniques are promising for current and future wireless systems. Amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying is more attractive due to the low cost and simplicity in its relay implementation. As compared to other AF schemes, the channel-state-information (CSI)-and noise (CSIN)-assisted one is optimal and practically recommended. However, up to this moment, the exact symbol error rate (SER) performance of CSIN-assisted AF dual-hop relaying systems has been analytically derived only for Rayleigh fading environments, while for other more generic fading models, including Nakagami-m , it has been computed either approximately or via long-running time computer simulations. Thus, in this paper, we consider a CSIN-assisted AF dual-hop relaying system with independent and non-identical Nakagami-m fading channels and derive a new expression for its exact SER performance under the effect of imperfect channel estimation. The derived expression includes infinite series that can truncate quickly using a few terms, requires short computational time as compare to simulation, shows perfect matching with the simulation results, and offers remarkable accuracy enhancement over its approximate peer derived in literature. In addition, it helps in demonstrating some useful insights into the system's realistic error performance considering different system and fading severity conditions. For example, results show that the system's exact SER performance is dominated by the worse fading hop, does not change when the system's two fading hops exchange their fading conditions, and improves faster with the per symbol average SNR when the fading severity conditions are better. (C) 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

This paper proposes a CSIN-assisted amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying scheme for dual-hop relaying systems and derives an exact symbol error rate (SER) performance expression under the effect of imperfect channel estimation. The derived expression includes quickly truncatable infinite series, requires short computational time, shows perfect matching with simulation results, and offers insights into the system's realistic error performance under different system and fading severity conditions.