On Achievable Rates for User Cooperation and Relay Channels

Mohammad Ali Khojastepour, Ashutosh Sabharwal, and Behnaam Aazhang {amir,ashu aaz}@rice.edu

Introduction

In this paper, we derive a new achievable rate region for the user cooperation channel, which exceeds the best known result for this channel [Wil83]. Since the user cooperation channel includes many other known channels as a special case, the new rate region provides an improved achievable rates for many of the special cases (discussed later). The most notable example is that of the Gaussian relay channel [CG79], for which we present a new closed form inner bound higher than the only known result (Theorem 5 in [CG79]). The basic idea of the proposed encoding and decoding scheme is easier to grasp for a simpler case, the relay channel, by keeping in mind the following Markovian scheme from [CG79]. In Markovian encoding, the relay decodes everything in the current block and uses it to establish a basis for common information sent from the transmitter and relay in the next block. The fact that Markovian coding does not achieve capacity depends on to two inter-related facts: (a) the relay decodes each codeword completely, and (b) discards the residual after decoding; this limits the relay channel capacity to the capacity between the source and the relay. Our proposed encoding does not require the relay to necessarily decode the whole codeword from the transmitter. In addition, the relay source encodes the whole received signal some implicit embedding of with the decoded information. Note that the signal transmitted by the relay is not separable into a source code and a channel code. For the user cooperation channel, the above operation is performed by both users for each others signal. Rest of the paper is organized as follows. We describe the user cooperation channel in Section 2. Then, we present the main result of the paper for discrete memoryless channels is presented in Section 3, including some special cases of the previously known sub-channels. Results on Gaussian user cooperation channel are presented in Section 4, which are used to improve the relay channel achievable rates in Section 5.

The User Cooperation Channel

We dene a discrete memoryless user-cooperation channel (UCC) depicted in Figure 1 as a channel with two inputs x1 and x2 , the output y, and two feedback outputs y1 and y2 , taking values from the set of alphabets X1 , X2 , Y, Y1 , and Y2 , respectively. Therefore, the channel is denoted by (X1 X2 , p(y, y1 , y2 |x1 , x2 ), Y Y1 Y2 ) where channel transition probability is given by p(y, y1 , y2 |x1 , x2 ). This channel has been considered by Carleial [Car82] as a multiple access channel with generalized feedback, where he rst established an achievable rate region for this channel. Later, Willems [Wil83] found an achievable rate region for this channel which improved upon the Carleial results and in the process, gave a simpler characterization of the rate region. It can be noted that this channel has the avor of the two-way channel [Sha61] (by ignoring the output Y ), the relay channel [CG79] (by ignoring output Y1 ), and multiple access channel [Ahl71] (by ignoring both of outputs Y1 and Y2 ), and also multiple-access channel with perfect feedback [CL81] (by letting both of the feedback outputs Y1 and Y2 be equal to Y ). Other special versions include relay channels with partial feedback [Kin78], one sided feedback [WM83], and generalized feedback [Kin78, Car82, Wil83]. Sendonaris et. al [SEA02a,SEA02b] were the rst one to propose the idea of increasing diversity gain through cooperation between the users and appropriately named it user cooperation diversity.
The authors are in Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University, 6100 Main St., MS-366, Houston, TX 77005.

S Y1

X1 Y Y2

T X2
Figure 1: User cooperation channel

3
3.1

Discrete Memoryless User Cooperation Channel Achievable Rate Region

Consider two independent message sources S, and T that produce random integers (messages) W1 {1, 2, . . . , M1 } and W2 {1, 2, . . . , M2 }, respectively, at the beginning of each block of N channel uses, such that each pair (w1 , w2 ) occurs with probability 1/M1 M2 . Each encoder is completely described by a set of N encoding functions. These functions map the message and the sequence of the corresponding outputs in the previous transmission into the next channel input. Thus we have x1n = f1n (w1 , Y1n1 ), x2n = f2n (w2 , Y2n1 ), (1)

for all n {1, 2, . . . , N }, where Yin1 = (Yi1 , Yi2 , . . . , Yi,n1 ) denotes the sequence of previously received signals at node i. The decoder estimates the messages W1 and W2 based on its knowledge of the sequence of the N received channel outputs, (w1 , w2 ) = g(Y N ). (2) An (M1 , M2 , N, Pe )-code for the d.m. UCC (Figure 1), consists of two sets of N encoding functions (1), and a decoding function (2) such that Prob{(w1 , w2 ) = (w1 , w2 )} = Pe . (3)

A rate pair (R1 , R2 ) is said to be achievable for this channel, if for any > 0 there exists an (M1 , M2 , N, Pe )code for suciently large N such that 0 R1 1 1 log(M1 ), 0 R2 log(M2 ). N N (4)

with small decoding error probability, i.e. Pe . RU CC , an achievable rate region for the d.m. UCC is the closure of the set of all achievable pairs (R1 , R2 ). We have the following Theorem which gives a single-letter characterization of the achievable rate region for this channel. The sketch of the proof of Theorem 1 is given in Section 3.3. Theorem 1 For the discrete memoryless user cooperation channel (X1 X2 , p(y, y1 , y2 |x1 , x2 ), Y Y1 Y2 ), an achievable rate region is given by the closure of all rate pairs (R1 , R2 ) given by 0 R1 I(V1 ; Y2 |X2 , U ) + I(X1 ; Y, Y2 |X2 , V1 , U ), 0 R2 I(V2 ; Y1 |X1 , U ) + I(X2 ; Y, Y1 |X1 , V2 , U ), 0 R1 + R2 min{I(V1 ; Y2 |X2 , U ) + I(V2 ; Y1 |X1 , U ) +I(X1 , X2 ; Y, Y1 , Y2 |V1 , V2 , U ), I(X1 , X2 ; Y )}, (7) for some probability mass functions p(u), p(v1 |u), p(v2 |u), p(x1 |v1 , u), p(x2 |v2 , u), p(y2 |x2 , y1 , u), p(y1 |x1 , y2 , u) and p(u, v1 , v2 , x1 , x2 , y, y1 , y2 , y1 , y1 ) = p(u)p(v1 |u)p(v2 |u)p(x1 |v1 , u)p(x2 |v2 , u)p(y2 |x2 , y1 , u)p(y1 | x1 , y2 , u)p (y, y1 , provided that the following inequalities hold I(Y2 ; Y2 |X2 , V1 , Y ) < I(X2 ; Y |U ), I(Y1 ; Y1 |X1 , V2 , Y ) < I(X1 ; Y |U ). 2 (8) (9) (5) (6)

The variables Y1 and Y2 are the joint source-channel coded signals transmitted by the two users to assist in the improved rates for the other user data. We note that the rate region of Theorem 1 strictly encloses all the known regions for the discrete memoryless multiple access with feedback to date, specically that of [CL81,Car82,Kin78,Wil83]. The only exception is the capacity region of Gaussian multiple access channel with feedback derived by Ozarow [Oza84]. As a specic example, the following corollary, obtained by using constant signals for Y1 and Y2 , provides an achievable rate for the discrete memoryless multiple access channel with generalized feedback [Wil83,Car82,Kin78]. Furthermore, the form of the rate region given in Theorem 1 is simpler as it requites fewer number of inequalities than previous results, but is identical to the rate region given in [Wil83].1 Corollary 1 For the discrete memoryless multiple access channel with generalized feedback [Wil83], an achievable rate region is given by 0 R1 I(V1 ; Y2 |X2 , U ) + I(X1 ; Y |X2 , V1 , U ), 0 R2 I(V2 ; Y1 |X1 , U ) + I(X2 ; Y |X1 , V2 , U ), 0 R1 + R2 min{I(V1 ; Y2 |X2 , U ) + I(V2 ; Y1 |X1 , U ) +I(X1 , X2 ; Y |V1 , V2 , U ), I(X1 , X2 ; Y )}, (12) for some probability mass functions p(u), p(v1 |u), p(v2 |u), p(x1 |v1 , u), p(x2 |v2 , u), where p(u, v1 , v2 , x1 , x2 , y, y1 , y2 ) = p(u) p(v1 |u) p(v2 |u) p(x1 |v1 , u) p(x2 |v2 , u)p(y, y1 , y2 |x1 , x2 ). Proof: Let Y2 = Y1 = in the region R dened in Theorem 1 by the inequalities (5)-(7). Note that the conditions (8) and (9) will be removed in this case. (10) (11)

3.2

Special Cases

Theorem 1 establishes a very general result and subsumes many known results as specic cases. Following are the examples for which the rate region of Theorem 1 coincide with the exact capacity of the channel. 1. Discrete memoryless degraded relay channel (Theorem 1 in [CG79]), reversely degraded relay channel (Theorem 2 in [CG79]), and semi-deterministic relay channel [GA82]. 2. Classical multiple access channel [Ahl71]. 3. Multiple access channel with cribbing encoders with causal cribbing signals (Situations 2, 5 and 6 studied in [WM85]). 4. Degraded multiple access channel with one sided feedback (Theorem 4 in [ZKB89]) or two sided feedback (Theorem 3 in [ZKB89]). In the following examples, the achievable rate region given by Theorem 1 enclose the previously known achievable rates to date. 1. Multiple access channel with generalized feedback [Kin78], where there is only one feedback signal which is dierent from the channel output which is received at the destination. 2. Discrete memoryless multiple access channel with feedback [CL81], where the feedback signal is causal observation of the channel output which is received at the destination. 3. Multiple-access channels with dierent generalized feedback signals [Car82], which is the most general case of feedback for the multiple access channel in which dierent feedback signals are observed by the transmitting nodes, that are dierent from the channel output as well. 4. An improved achievable rate region for multiple access channel with generalized feedback [Wil83].
worth mentioning that the region of King [Kin78] in general contains some achievable rate pairs which are not included in the region given by Willems [Wil82] or Carleial [Car82]. However, Theorem 1 includes Kings region too.
1 It

3.3

Sketch of the Proof of Theorem 1

To prove the achievability, we use the notion of -typical N -sequences and random coding argument. We also use the superposition block Markov encoding technique [CL81] to exploit the feedback signals and introduce the cooperation between the encoding process for the consecutive blocks. Additionally, we also use the idea of backward decoding (or restricted decoding) introduced in [Wil83].2 In some cases, cooperation between users is not possible or more costly than direct transmission. In these cases, another known technique is helpful, transmission of the estimate of the feedback signals to the destinations [GV02]. Therefore, each encoding node Xi , i = 1, 2, constructs a statistical output Yi and sends it to the destination node. Then, the decoder can gure out these signals Yi , i = 1, 2, and use them together with the channel output Y to decode the transmitted messages. To transmit the estimate of the feedback signals to the destination node, we do not need to establish another level of backward decoding. Instead, we use the random-partitioning and list decoding, overlaid on the same one level block Markov encoding and backward decoding. The random codebook is generated according to the xed distribution given in the statement of Theorem 1. Assume that the messages W1 {1, 2, . . . , M1 } and W2 {1, 2, . . . , M2 } will be sent over the channel in N channel use from users 1 and 2, respectively. In order to use superposition block Markov encoding, we transmit messages W1,b {1, 2, . . . , M1 } and W2,b {1, 2, . . . , M2 } in B blocks of N transmissions. In order to use backward decoding we divide each message W1,b and W2,b into two parts W1,b = (W12,b , W11,b ) and W2,b = (W21,b , W22,b ) where W11,b {1, 2, . . . , M11 = exp(N R11 )}, W12,b {1, 2, . . . , M12 = exp(N R12 )}, W21,b {1, 2, . . . , M21 = exp(N R21 )}, and W22,b {1, 2, . . . , M22 = exp(N R22 )}, which are mutually independent of each other and uniformly distributed over their respective ranges. In backward decoding, actual transmission will take place only in the B 1 blocks out of possible B blocks. Therefore there would be a 1 negligible rate loss by factor of 1 B1 = B which vanishes as B . The messages W11 and W22 can be B interpreted as the messages which are directly sent to the decoder. While, the messages W12 and W21 contain new high rate information which is sent from User 1 to User 2 and from User 2 to User 1, respectively, via the feedback outputs Y2 and Y1 . Both of the encoders then cooperate in sending the resolution information to the decoder by means of the decoded message pairs (W12 , W21 ) at the decoders of Nodes 1 and 2 obtained from the transmission in the previous block. Also, each transmitter i constructs a statistical output Yi based on the received feedback signal Yi which provides an estimate of the received signal at the encoding nodes for the destination node. The decoding is performed from the last block, where no new information is sent by the users. The decoder of the destination node rst decodes the cooperative signal (W12,B , W21,B ) which contains the resolution information and then nds the statistical signals Y1,B1 and Y2,B1 that are the estimate of feedback signals (which are transmitted in the last block) using list decoding. Going to one block before, the decoded resolution information and statistical signals Y1,B1 and Y2,B1 enables the decoder to decode the fresh information (W11,B1 , W22,B1 ) in this block, and furthermore decode the resolution information (W12,B1 , W21,B1 ) in this block simultaneously. Then it again nds the estimates of feedback signals which is received in this block. This decoding will be recursively performed until decoder reaches the rst block.

Gaussian User Cooperation Channel

By using Theorem 1, and considering very simple choices of the statistical signals channel outputs Y1 and Y2 as linear functions of observed feedback signals Y1 and Y2 , one can readily show that the following rate region is achievable for Gaussian UCC of gure 2. Corollary 2 For the Gaussian UCC, with the channel gains b1 and b2 and user cooperation channel gains a1 and a2 with mutually independent gaussian noise sources Z N (0, N ), Z1 N (0, N1 ), and Z2 N (0, N2 ), the following rate region is achievable R1 < R2 < R3 <
2A

a2 P1 b2 P1 1 2 log2 1 + + 1 2 N2 + N4 N 1 a2 P2 b2 P2 1 log2 1 + + 2 2 N1 + N3 N 1+ a2 P2 b2 P2 1 + 2 N1 + N3 N b2 b2 P2 P1 2 1 N2

(13) (14) (15)

1 log2 2

1+

a2 P1 b2 P1 2 + 1 N2 + N4 N

very strong technique, often used to prove multi-user information theory results.

0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0 The rate region of [Wil83] New rate region (Theorem 2)

S Y1

X1 Z1 a1 Y2 X2 a2 Z2

b1 Z Y

b2

R2 (bits/channel use)

0.1

0.2

0.3 0.4 0.5 R (bits/channel use)

1

0.6

0.7

(a)

(b)

Figure 2: (a) Gaussian user cooperation channel, (b) An example of the achievable rate region for Gaussian user
cooperation channel (a1 = b1 = b2 = P1 = P2 = N = N1 = N2 = 1 and a2 = 0.9).

where N3 = N4 =

N a2 P2 + N1 (b2 P2 + N ) 1 2 b2 P1 1

(16) (17)

N a2 P1 + N2 (b2 P1 + N ) 2 1 b2 P2 2 and P1 ,P2 are the average power constraint on input signals X1 and X2 , respectively.

Proof: Let Y1 = Y1 + Z3 and Y2 = Y2 + Z4 and for the sake of simplicity assume that X1 , X2 , Z3 and Z4 are zero mean gaussian random variables with variance P1 ,P2 , N1 , and N2 , respectively. The calculation of the mutual information in Theorem 1 is then straight forward and leads to the above mentioned corollary. Note that due to the existence of two conditions (8) and (9) there is an optimization involved to nd the values of N3 and N4 ; the optimum values are given by (16) and (17). It should be noted that the above rate region is strictly larger than all previously established results for the user cooperation channel [Wil83,Car82,Kin78] where the SNR of inter-user channel is less than the SNR of the direct links from the users to the destination. Figure 2 shows a numerical example of the rate region of Corollary 2 in comparison to that of Willems [Wil83] which is the best known achievable rate for user cooperation channel to date.

Gaussian Relay Channel

The problem of nding capacity of the relay channel has been an outstanding question in the past 30 years, and the results of Cover and El Gamal [CG79] are the best known rates for the original relay problem. Here, we present a new lower bound to the capacity of gaussian cheap relay channel that improves upon the result of Theorem 5 in [CG79] for almost all possible values of the channel parameters and input power constraints, and furthermore it approaches relay channel capacity as SNR of relay-destination channel approaches innity. The beauty of the following result is that it falls out as a special case of Theorem 2 by setting the channel gain a2 = 0. Corollary 3 Let > 0 be an arbitrarily small value. For the Gaussian relay channel (gure 2 by ignoring the feedback output Y2 and the source S) , with the channel gains b1 , b2 and a1 between source-destination, relaydestination, and source-relay, respectively, and mutually independent gaussian noise sources Z N (0, N ) and Z1 N (0, N1 ), the following rate is achievable. 2 2 1 a1 P2 b P2 R = log2 1 + + 2 (18) N a2 P2 +N1 (b2 P2 +N ) 1 2 2 N N1 + 2
b1 P1

Where P1 , P2 are the average power constraint on input signal of the relay, X1 , and the source, X2 , respectively. Figure 3 shows a numerical example of the achievable rate of Corollary 3 in comparison to that of Cover and El Gamal [CG79]. Although, the achievable rate of Corollary 3 is obtained through series of simplications from Theorem 1, it is still asymptotically optimal. In other words, as SNR (b1 or P1 ) of channel between the relay and the destination improves, the rate of (3) approaches the capacity of the relay channel. 5

2 1.8 1.6
R (bits/channel use)

1.4 1.2 1 0.8 0.6 0.4 0.2 0 0 2 Covers achievable rate [Cov79] New achievable rate (Corollary 2) 4 6 Input power P1 = P2 8 10

Figure 3: An example of the achievable rates for Gaussian relay channel (a1 = b1 = b2 = P1 = P2 = N = N1 = 1).

Concluding Remarks

We presented an improved achievable rates for user cooperation and relay channels, based on two key ideas that the relay nodes need not decode the codewords completely and should not discard the residual information after decoding the packets. Our designs of the statistical signals Y1 and Y2 for Gaussian cases is clearly suboptimal, yet yield gains over known results. An immediate next step is optimal design of Y1 and Y2 for which some results have already been obtained and will be presented elsewhere.

References
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