Broadband analog network coding

In this letter, we present the performance of broadband bi-directional transmission with analog network coding (ANC) in a frequency-selective fading channel. To cope with the channel frequency-selectivity we introduce the use of frequency domain equalization (FDE) with broadband ANC based on orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) and single carrier (SC) radio access. We evaluate, by theory and computer simulation, the achievable bit error rate (BER) and ergodic capacity of bi-directional ANC scheme based on OFDM and SCFDE radio access in a frequency-selective fading channel. Our results show that SC-FDE achieves a better BER performance, but on the other hand, a lower ergodic capacity in comparison with OFDM in a frequency-selective fading channel. Through both analysis and computer simulation, our findings show that a drawback of ANC scheme is its lack of diversity combining at the destination, which causes a slightly lower ergodic capacity in comparison with cooperative relaying irrespective of radio access scheme.