Performance Study and Optimization of Cooperative Diversity Networks with Co-Channel Interference

In this paper, we investigate the effect of co-channel interference on the performance of cooperative diversity networks with amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying. We consider both conventional and opportunistic relaying. First, we obtain a tight upper-bound for the equivalent signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) at the destination. Subsequently, the cumulative distribution function (CDF), probability density function (PDF) and moment generating function (MGF) of the effective SINR are determined based on the upper-bound. Expressions for the error probabilities in both conventional and opportunistic relaying are derived utilizing the statistical characterization of the effective SINR. We also derive an approximate PDF of the equivalent instantaneous SINR at the destination. This leads to a simple and general asymptotic error probability expression which facilitates better insight into the effect of different system parameters on the error probability. Furthermore, we investigate the problem of optimum resource allocation in the network aiming at improving performance in the presence of resource constraints. We present numerical results that illustrate the excellent match between the analytical results and the simulation results, and the performance enhancement resulting from the proposed optimal resource allocation.