Showing papers in "Journal of Communications and Networks in 2013"

Compressive sensing: From theory to applications, a survey

Abstract: Compressive sensing (CS) is a novel sampling paradigm that samples signals in a much more efficient way than the established Nyquist sampling theorem. CS has recently gained a lot of attention due to its exploitation of signal sparsity. Sparsity, an inherent characteristic of many natural signals, enables the signal to be stored in few samples and subsequently be recovered accurately, courtesy of CS. This article gives a brief background on the origins of this idea, reviews the basic mathematical foundation of the theory and then goes on to highlight different areas of its application with a major emphasis on communications and network domain. Finally, the survey concludes by identifying new areas of research where CS could be beneficial.

Effects of channel aging in massive MIMO systems

Abstract: Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communication may provide high spectral efficiency through the deployment of a very large number of antenna elements at the base stations. The gains from massive MIMO communication come from the use of multiuser MIMO on the uplink and downlink, but with a large excess of antennas at the base station compared to the number of served users. Initial work on massive MIMO did not fully address several practical issues associated with its deployment. This paper considers the impact of channel aging on the performance of massive MIMO systems. The effects of channel variation are characterized as a function of different system parameters assuming a simple model for the channel time variations at the transmitter. Channel prediction is proposed to overcome channel aging effects. The analytical results on aging show how capacity is lost due to time variation in the channel. Numerical results in a multiceli network show that massive MIMO works even with some channel variation and that channel prediction could partially overcome channel aging effects.

Ultra broadband indoor channel measurements and calibrated ray tracing propagation modeling at THz frequencies

Abstract: Ultra broadband communication systems operated at THz frequencies will require the thorough knowledge of the propagation channel. Therefore, an extensive measurement campaign of 50 GHz wide indoor radio channels is presented for the frequencies between 275 and 325 GHz. Individual ray paths are resolved spatially according to angle of arrival and departure. A MIMO channel is recorded in a 2×2 configuration. An advanced frequency domain ray tracing approach is used to deterministically simulate the THz indoor propagation channel. The ray tracing results are validated with the measurement data. Moreover, the measurements are utilized for the calibration of the ray tracing algorithm. Resulting ray tracing accuracies are discussed.

A beacon-based trust management system for enhancing user centric location privacy in VANETs

Abstract: In recent years, more and more researches have been focusing on trust management of vehicle ad-hoc networks (VANETs) for improving the safety of vehicles However, in these researches, little attention has been paid to the location privacy due to the natural conflict between trust and anonymity, which is the basic protection of privacy Although traffic safety remains the most crucial issue in VANETs, location privacy can be just as important for drivers, and neither can be ignored In this paper, we propose a beacon-based trust management system, called BTM, that aims to thwart internal attackers from sending false messages in privacy-enhanced VANETs To evaluate the reliability and performance of the proposed system, we conducted a set of simulations under alteration attacks, bogus message attacks, and message suppression attacks The simulation results show that the proposed system is highly resilient to adversarial attacks, whether it is under a fixed silent period or random silent period location privacy-enhancement scheme

Efficient and secure routing protocol for wireless sensor networks through SNR based dynamic clustering mechanisms

Abstract: Advances in wireless sensor network (WSN) technology have enabled small and low-cost sensors with the capability of sensing various types of physical and environmental conditions, data processing, and wireless communication. In the WSN, the sensor nodes have a limited transmission range and their processing and storage capabilities as well as their energy resources are limited. A triple umpiring system has already been proved for its better performance in WSNs. The clustering technique is effective in prolonging the lifetime of the WSN. In this study, we have modified the ad-hoc on demand distance vector routing by incorporating signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) based dynamic clustering. The proposed scheme, which is an efficient and secure routing protocol for wireless sensor networks through SNR-based dynamic clustering (ESRPSDC) mechanisms, can partition the nodes into clusters and select the cluster head (CH) among the nodes based on the energy, and non CH nodes join with a specific CH based on the SNR values. Error recovery has been implemented during the inter-cluster routing in order to avoid end-to-end error recovery. Security has been achieved by isolating the malicious nodes using sink-based routing pattern analysis. Extensive investigation studies using a global mobile simulator have shown that this hybrid ESRP significantly improves the energy efficiency and packet reception rate as compared with the SNR unaware routing algorithms such as the low energy aware adaptive clustering hierarchy and power efficient gathering in sensor information systems.

Widely-linear beamforming and RF impairment suppression in massive antenna arrays

Abstract: In this paper, the sensitivity of massive antenna arrays and digital beamforming to radio frequency (RF) chain in-phase quadrature-phase (I/Q) imbalance is studied and analyzed. The analysis shows that massive antenna arrays are increasingly sensitive to such RF chain imperfections, corrupting heavily the radiation pattern and beamforming capabilities. Motivated by this, novel RF-aware digital beamforming methods are then developed for automatically suppressing the unwanted effects of the RF I/Q imbalance without separate calibration loops in all individual receiver branches. More specifically, the paper covers closed-form analysis for signal processing properties as well as the associated radiation and beamforming properties of massive antenna arrays under both systematic and random RF I/Q imbalances. All analysis and derivations in this paper assume ideal signals to be circular. The well-known minimum variance distortionless response (MVDR) beamformer and a widely-linear (WL) extension of it, called WL-MVDR, are analyzed in detail from the RF imperfection perspective, in terms of interference attenuation and beamsteering. The optimum RF-aware WL-MVDR beamforming solution is formulated and shown to efficiently suppress the RF imperfections. Based on the obtained results, the developed solutions and in particular the RF-aware WL-MVDR method can provide efficient beamsteering and interference suppressing characteristics, despite of the imperfections in the RF circuits. This is seen critical especially in the massive antenna array context where the cost-efficiency of individual RF chains is emphasized.

Special issue on Massive MIMO

Abstract: Demand for wireless communications is projected to grow by more than a factor of forty or more over the next five years. A potential technology for meeting this demand is Massive MIMO (also called Large-Scale Antenna Systems, Large-Scale MIMO, ARGOS, Full-Dimension MIMO, or Hyper-MIMO), a form of multiuser multipleantenna wireless which promises orders-of-magnitude improvements in spectral-efficiency over 4G technology, and accompanying improvements in radiated energy-efficiency. The distinguishing feature of Massive MIMO is that a large number of service-antennas ? possibly hundreds or even thousands ? work for a significantly smaller number of active autonomous terminals. Upsetting the traditional parity between service antennas and terminals in this manner is a game-changer: The simplest multiplexing precoding and decoding algorithms can be nearly optimal, expensive ultra-linear forty-Watt power amplifiers are replaced by many low-power units, and the favorable action of the law of large numbers can greatly facilitate power-control and resource-allocation.

Call admission control based on adaptive bandwidth allocation for wireless networks

Abstract: Provisioning of quality of service (QoS) is a key issue in any multi-media system. However, in wireless systems, supporting QoS requirements of different traffic types is a more challenging problem due to the need to simultaneously minimize two performance metrics - the probability of dropping a handover call and the probability of blocking a new call. Since QoS requirements are not as stringent for non-real-time traffic, as opposed to real-time traffic, more calls can be accommodated by releasing some bandwidth from the already admitted non-real-time traffic calls. If the released bandwidth that is used to handle handover calls is larger than the released bandwidth that is used for new calls, then the resulting probability of dropping a handover call is smaller than the probability of blocking a new call. In this paper, we propose an efficient call admission control algorithm that relies on adaptive multi-level bandwidth-allocation scheme for non-realtime calls. The scheme allows reduction of the call dropping probability, along with an increase in the bandwidth utilization. The numerical results show that the proposed scheme is capable of attaining negligible handover call dropping probability without sacrificing bandwidth utilization.

Adaptive video streaming over HTTP with dynamic resource estimation

Abstract: Adaptive hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) streaming has become a new trend to support adaptivity in video delivery. An HTTP streaming client needs to estimate exactly resource availability and resource demand. In this paper, we focus on the most important resource which is bandwidth. A new and general formulation for throughput estimation is presented taking into account previous values of instant throughput and round trip time. Besides, we introduce for the first time the use of bitrate estimation in HTTP streaming. The experiments show that our approach can effectively cope with drastic changes in connection throughput and video bitrate.

Enhanced OLSR for defense against DOS attack in ad hoc networks

Abstract: Mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) refers to a network designed for special applications for which it is difficult to use a backbone network. In MANETs, applications are mostly involved with sensitive and secret information. Since MANET assumes a trusted environment for routing, security is a major issue. In this paper we analyze the vulnerabilities of a pro-active routing protocol called optimized link state routing (OLSR) against a specific type of denial-of-service (DOS) attack called node isolation attack. Analyzing the attack, we propose a mechanism called enhanced OLSR (EOLSR) protocol which is a trust based technique to secure the OLSR nodes against the attack. Our technique is capable of finding whether a node is advertising correct topology information or not by verifying its Hello packets, thus detecting node isolation attacks. The experiment results show that our protocol is able to achieve routing security with 45% increase in packet delivery ratio and 44% reduction in packet loss rate when compared to standard OLSR under node isolation attack. Our technique is light weight because it doesn't involve high computational complexity for securing the network.

Performance analysis of opportunistic spectrum access protocol for multi-channel cognitive radio networks

Abstract: Cognitive radio (CR) has emerged as one of effective methods to enhance the utilization of existing radio spectrum. Main principle of CR is that secondary users (SUs) are allowed to use the spectrum unused by primary users (PUs) without interfering PU's transmissions. In this paper, PUs operate on a slot-by-slot basis and SUs try to exploit the slots unused by PUs. We propose OSA protocols in the single channel and we propose an opportunistic spectrum access (OSA) protocols in the multi-channel cognitive radio networks with one control channel and several licensed channels where a slot is divided into contention phase and transmission phase. A slot is divided into reporting phase, contention phase and transmission phase. The reporting phase plays a role of finding idle channels unused by PUs and the contention phase plays a role of selecting a SU who will send packets in the data transmission phase. One SU is selected by carrier sense multiple access / collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) with request to send / clear to send (RTS/CTS) mechanism on control channel and the SU is allowed to occupy all remaining part of all idle channels during the current slot. For mathematical analysis, first we deal with the single-channel case and we model the proposed OSA media access control (MAC) protocol by three-dimensional discrete time Markov chain (DTMC) whose one-step transition probability matrix has a special structure so as to apply the censored Markov chain method to obtain the steady state distribution. We obtain the throughput and the distribution of access delay. Next we deal with the multi-channel case and obtain the throughput and the distribution of access delay by using results of single-channel case. In numerical results, our mathematical analysis is verified by simulations and we give numerical results on throughput and access delay of the proposed MAC protocol. Finally, we find the maximum allowable number of SUs satisfying the requirements on throughput and access delay.

Spectrum sharing-based multi-hop decode-and-forward relay networks under interference constraints: Performance analysis and relay position optimization

Abstract: The exact closed-form expressions for outage probability and bit error rate of spectrum sharing-based multi-hop decode-and-forward (DF) relay networks in non-identical Rayleigh fading channels are derived. We also provide the approximate closed-form expression for the system ergodic capacity. Utilizing these tractable analytical formulas, we can study the impact of key network parameters on the performance of cognitive multi-hop relay networks under interference constraints. Using a linear network model, we derive an optimum relay position scheme by numerically solving an optimization problem of balancing average signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of each hop. The numerical results show that the optimal scheme leads to SNR performance gains of more than 1 dB. AU the analytical expressions are verified by Monte-Carlo simulations confirming the advantage of multihop DF relaying networks in cognitive environments.

A seamless flow mobility management architecture for vehicular communication networks

Abstract: Vehicular ad-hoc networks (VANETs) are self-organizing, self-healing networks which provide wireless communication among vehicular and roadside devices. Applications in such networks can take advantage of the use of simultaneous connections, thereby maximizing the throughput and lowering latency. In order to take advantage of all radio interfaces of the vehicle and to provide good quality of service for vehicular applications, we developed a seamless flow mobility management architecture based on vehicular network application classes with network-based mobility management. Our goal is to minimize the time of flow connection exchange in order to comply with the minimum requirements of vehicular application classes, as well as to maximize their throughput. Network simulator (NS-3) simulations were performed to analyse the behaviour of our architecture by comparing it with other three scenarios. As a result of this work, we observed that the proposed architecture presented a low handover time, with lower packet loss and lower delay.

Optimal number of users in zero-forcing based multiuser MIMO systems with large number of antennas

Abstract: The optimal number of users achieving the maximum sum throughput is analyzed in zero-forcing (ZF) based multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems with a large number of base station (BS) antennas. By utilizing deterministic ergodic sum rates for the ZF-beamforming (ZF-BF) and ZF-receiver (ZF-R) with a large number of BS antennas [1], [2], we can obtain the ergodic sum throughputs for the ZF-BF and ZF-R for the uplink and downlink frame structures, respectively. Then, we can also formulate and solve the optimization problems maximizing the ergodic sum throughputs with respect to the number of users. This paper shows that the approximate downlink sum throughput for the ZF-BF is a concave function and the approximate uplink sum throughput for the ZF-R is also a concave function in a feasible range with respect to the number of users. The simulation results verify the analyses and show that the derived numbersof users provide the maximum sum throughputs for the ZF-BF as well as ZF-R in multiuser MIMO systems with a large number of BS antennas.

Infotainment services based on push-mode dissemination in an integrated VANET and 3G architecture

Abstract: Given the bandwidth assignment for dedicated short range communications for use in vehicular ad-hoc network (VANET) and the expected introduction of equipment in the next few years, we elaborate on how VANET can support infotainment services. We define an architectural model for the integration of VANETs and cellular networks, according to a push mode paradigm where VANETs are used primarily to disseminate service announcements and general interest messages. Cooperation with cellular network is addressed by comparing architecture alternatives. A set of information dissemination protocols for VANETs is compared via simulations on a real urban map. Some results from a lab testbed based on IEEE 802.11p boards are presented along with an application developed for Android operating system to demonstrate the concept of the paper.

Wireless communication at 310 GHz using GaAs high-electron-mobility transistors for detection

Abstract: We report on the first error-free terahertz (THz) wireless communication at 0310 THz for data rates up to 82 Gbps using a 18-GHz-bandwidth GaAs/AlGaAs field-effect transistor as a detector This result demonstrates that low-cost commercially-available plasma-wave transistors whose cut-off frequency is far below THz frequencies can be employed in THz communication Wireless communication over 50 cm is presented at 14 Gbps using a uni-travelling-carrier photodiode as a source Transistor integration is detailed, as it is essential to avoid any deleterious signals that would prevent successful communication We observed an improvement of the bit error rate with increasing input THz power, followed by a degradation at high input power Such a degradation appears at lower powers if the photodiode bias is smaller Higher-data-rate communication is demonstrated using a frequency-multiplied source thanksto higher output power Bit-error-rate measurements at data rates up to 10 Gbps are performed for different input THz powers As expected, bit error rates degrade as data rate increases However, degraded communication is observed at some specific data rates This effect is probably due to deleterious cavity effects and/or impedance mismatches Using such a system, realtime uncompressed high-definition video signal is successfully and robustly transmitted

Spectrum leasing and cooperative resource allocation in cognitive OFDMA networks

Abstract: This paper considers a cooperative orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA)-based cognitive radio network where the primary system leases some of its subchannels to the secondary system for a fraction of time in exchange for the secondary users (SUs) assisting the transmission of primary users (PUs) as relays. Our aim is to determine the cooperation strategies among the primary and secondary systems so as to maximize the sum-rate of SUs while maintaining quality-of-service (QoS) requirements of PUs. We formulate a joint optimization problem of PU transmission mode selection, SU (or relay) selection, subcarrier assignment, power control, and time allocation. By applying dual method, this mixed integer programming problem is decomposed into parallel per-subcarrier subproblems, with each determining the cooperation strategy between one PU and one SU We show that, on each leased subcarrier, the optimal strategy is to let a SU exclusively act as a relay or transmit for itself. This result is fundamentally different from the conventional spectrum leasing in single-channel systems where a SU must transmit a fraction of time for itself if it helps the PU's transmission. We then propose a subgradient-based algorithm to find the asymptotically optimal solution to the primal problem in polynomial time. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm can significantly enhance the network performance.

CFP scheduling for real-time service and energy efficiency in the industrial applications of IEEE 802.15.4

Abstract: In industrial applications, sensor networks have to satisfy specified time requirements of exchanged messages. IEEE 802.15.4 defines the communication protocol of the physical and medium access control layers for wireless sensor networks, which support real-time transmission through guaranteed time slots (GTSs). In order to improve the performance of IEEE 802.15.4 in industrial applications, this paper proposes a new traffic scheduling algorithm for GTS. This algorithm concentrates on time-critical industrial periodic messages and determines the values of network and node parameters for GTS. It guarantees real-time requirements of periodic messages for industrial automation systems up to the order of tens to hundreds of milliseconds depending on the traffic condition of the network system. A series of simulation results are obtained to examine the validity of the scheduling algorithm proposed in this study. The simulation results show that this scheduling algorithm not only guarantees real-time requirements for periodic message but also improves the scalability, bandwidth utilization, and energy efficiency of the network with a slight modification of the existing IEEE 802.15.4 protocol.

A channel state information feedback method for massive MIMO-OFDM

Abstract: Combining multiple-input multiple-output orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) with a massive number of transmit antennas (massive MIMO-OFDM) is an attractive way of increasing the spectrum efficiency or reducing the transmission energy per bit. The effectiveness of Massive MIMO-OFDM is strongly affected by the channel state information (CSI) estimation method used. The overheads of training frame transmission and CSI feedback decrease multiple access channel (MAC) efficiency and increase the CSI estimation cost at a user station (STA). This paper proposes a CSI estimation scheme that reduces the training frame length by using a novel pilot design and a novel unitary matrix feedback method. The proposed pilot design and unitary matrix feedback enable the access point (AP) to estimate the CSI of the signal space of all transmit antennas using a small number of training frames. Simulations in an IEEE 802.11n channel verify the attractive transmission performance of the proposed methods.

Identity-based proxy signature from lattices

Abstract: Most of the provably-secure proxy signature schemes rely on the average-case hardness problems such as the integer factorization problems and the discrete logarithm problems. Therefore, those schemes are insecure to quantum analysis algorithms, since there exist quantum algorithms efficiently solving the factorization and logarithm problems. To make secure proxy signature schemes against quantum analysis, some lattice-based proxy signature schemes are suggested. However, none of the suggested lattice-based proxy signature schemes is proxy-protected in the adaptive security model. In the paper, we propose a provably-secure ID-based proxy signature scheme based on the lattice problems. Our scheme is proxy-protected in the adaptive security model.

Mobile-based relay selection schemes for multi-hop cellular networks

Abstract: Multi-hop cellular networks (MCNs), which reduce the transmit power, mitigate the inter-cell interference, and improve the system performance, have been widely studied nowadays. The relay selection scheme is a key technique that achieves these advantages, and inappropriate relay selection causes frequent relay switchings, which deteriorates the overall performance. In this study, we analyze the conditions for relay switching in MCNs and obtain the expressions for the relay switching rate and relay activation time. Two mobile-based relay selection schemes are proposed on the basis of this analysis. These schemes select the relay node with the longest relay activation time and minimal relay switching rate through mobility prediction of the mobile node requiring relay and available relay nodes. We compare the system performances via simulation and analyze the impact of various parameters on the system performance. The results show that the two proposed schemes can obtain a lower relay switching rate and longer relay activation time when there is no reduction in the system throughput as compared with the existing schemes.

Secure and robust clustering for quantized target tracking in wireless sensor networks

Abstract: We consider the problem of secure and robust clustering for quantized target tracking in wireless sensor networks (WSN) where the observed system is assumed to evolve according to a probabilistic state space model. We propose a new method for jointly activating the best group of candidate sensors that participate in data aggregation, detecting the malicious sensors and estimating the target position. Firstly, we select the appropriate group in order to balance the energy dissipation and to provide the required data of the target in the WSN. This selection is also based on the transmission power between a sensor node and a cluster head. Secondly, we detect the malicious sensor nodes based on the information relevance of their measurements. Then, we estimate the target position using quantized variational filtering (QVF) algorithm. The selection of the candidate sensors group is based on multi-criteria function, which is computed by using the predicted target position provided by the QVF algorithm, while the malicious sensor nodes detection is based on Kullback-Leibler distance between the current target position distribution and the predicted sensor observation. The performance of the proposed method is validated by simulation results in target tracking for WSN.

Performance evaluation of improved fast PMIPv6-based network mobility for intelligent transportation systems

Abstract: The network mobility basic support (NEMO BS) protocol has been investigated to provide Internet connectivity for a group of nodes, which is suitable for intelligent transportation systems (ITS) applications. NEMO BS often increases the traffic load and handover latency because it is designed on the basis of mobile Internet protocol version 6 (MIPv6). Therefore, schemes combining proxy MIPv6 with NEMO (P-NEMO) have emerged to solve these problems. However, these schemes still suffer from packet loss and long handover latency during handover. Fast P-NEMO (FP-NEMO) has emerged to prevent these problems. Although the FP-NEMO accelerates handover, it can cause a serious tunneling burden between the mobile access gateways (MAGs) during handover. This problem becomes more critical as the traffic between the MAGs increases. Therefore, we propose a scheme for designing an improved FP-NEMO (IFP-NEMO) to eliminate the tunneling burden by registering a new address in advance. When the registration is completed before the layer 2 handover, the packets are forwarded to the new MAG directly and thereby the IFP-NEMO avoids the use of the tunnel between the MAGs during handover. For the evaluation of the performance of the IFP-NEMO compared with the FP-NEMO, we develop an analytical framework for fast handovers on the basis of P-NEMO. Finally, we demonstrate that the IFP-NEMO outperforms the FP-NEMO through numerical results.

Before/after precoding massive MIMO systems for cloud radio access networks

Abstract: In this paper, we investigate two types of in-phase and quadrature-phase (IQ) data transfer methods for cloud multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) network operation. They are termed “after-precoding” and “before-precoding”. We formulate a cloud massive MIMO operation problem that aims at selecting the best IQ data transfer method and transmission strategy (beamforming technique, the number of concurrently receiving users, the number of used antennas for transmission) to maximize the ergodic sum-rate under a limited capacity of the digital unit-radio unit link. Based on our proposed solution, the optimal numbers of users and antennas are simultaneously chosen. Numerical results confirm that the sum-rate gain is greater when adaptive “after/before-precoding” method is available than when only conventional “after-precoding” IQ-data transfer is available.

Characterization of effective capacity in antenna selection MIMO systems

Abstract: In this paper, the effective capacity of a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system in two different cases with receive antenna selection (RAS) and transmit antenna selection (TAS) schemes is investigated. A closed-form solution for the maximum constant arrival rate of this network with statistical delay quality of service (QoS) constraint is extracted in the quasi-static fading channel. This study is conducted in two different cases. When channel state information (CSI) is not available at the MIMO transmitter, implementation of TAS is difficult. Therefore, RAS scheme is employed and one antenna with the maximum instantaneous signal to noise ratio is chosen at the receiver. On the other hand, when CSI is available at the transmitter, TAS scheme is executed. In this case, one antenna is selected at the transmitter. Moreover, an optimal power-control policy is applied to the selected antenna and the effective capacity of the MIMO system is derived. Finally, this optimal power adaptation and the effective capacity are investigated in two asymptotic cases with the loose and strict QoS requirements. In particular, we show that in the TAS scheme with the loose QoS restriction, the effective capacity converges to the ergodic capacity. Then, an exact closed-form solution is obtained for the ergodic capacity of the channel here.

16-QAM periodic complementary sequence mates based on interleaving technique and quadriphase periodic complementary sequence mates

Abstract: Based on an interleaving technique and quadriphase periodic complementary sequence (CS) mates, this paper presents a method for constructing a family of 16-quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) periodic CS mates. The resulting mates arise from the conversion of quadriphase periodic CS mates, and the period of the former is twice as long as that of the latter. In addition, based on the existing binary periodic CS mates, a table on the existence of the proposed 16-QAM periodic CS mates is given. Furthermore, the proposed method can also transform a mutually orthogonal (MO) quadriphase CS set into an MO 16-QAM CS set. Finally, three examples are given to demonstrate the validity of the proposed method.

Maximum likelihood and signal-selective TDOA estimation for noncircular signals

Abstract: This paper addresses the issue of time-difference-of-arrival (TDOA) estimation for complex noncircular signals. First, under the wide-sense stationary assumption, we derive the maximum likelihood (ML) estimator and the Cramer-Rao lower bound for Gaussian noncircular signals in Gaussian circular noise. The ML estimator uses the second-order statistics information of a noncircular signal more comprehensively when compared with the cross-correlation (CC) and the conjugate CC estimators. Further, we present a scheme to modify the traditional signal-selective TDOA methods for noncircular signals on the basis of the cyclostationarity of man-made signals. This scheme simultaneously exploits the information contained in both the cyclic cross-correlation (CCC) and the conjugate CCC of a noncircular signal.

HeNB-aided virtual-handover for range expansion in LTE femtocell networks

Abstract: Home evolved Node-B (HeNB), also called a femtocell or a femto base station, is introduced to provide high data rate to indoor users. However, two main problems arise in femtocell networks: (1) Small coverage area of HeNB, which results in limited cell-splitting gain and ping-pong handover (HO) problems and (2) high inter-femtocell interference because HeNBs may be densely deployed in a small region. In this study, an efficient cooperation mechanism called an HeNB-aided virtual-HO (HaVHO) scheme is proposed to expand the coverage area of femtocells and to reduce inter-femtocell interference. The cooperation among neighbor HeNBs is exploited in HaVHO by enabling an HeNB to relay the data of its neighbor HeNB without an HO. The HaVHO procedure is compatible with the existing long term evolution specification, and the information exchange overhead in HaVHO is relatively low. To estimate the signal to interference plus noise ratio improvement, the area average channel state metric is proposed, and the amount of user throughput enhancement by HaVHO is derived. System-level simulation shows that HaVHO has a better performance than the other four schemes, such as lesser radio link failure, lesser ping-pong handover, lesser short-stay handover, and higher user throughput.

Evaluation of the use of guard nodes for securing the routing in VANETs

Abstract: We address the problem of effective vehicular routing in hostile scenarios where malicious nodes intend to jeopardize the delivery of messages. Compromised vehicles can severely affect the performance of the network by a number of attacks, such as selectively dropping messages, manipulating them on the fly, and the likes. One of the best performing solutions that has been used in static wireless sensor networks to deal with these attacks is based on the concept of watchdog nodes (also known as guard nodes) that collaborate to continue the forwarding of data packets in case a malicious behavior in a neighbor node is detected. In this work, we consider the beacon-less routing algorithm for vehicular environments routing protocol, which has been previously shown to perform very well in vehicular networks, and analyze whether a similar solution would be feasible for vehicular environments. Our simulation results in an urban scenario show that watchdog nodes are able to avoid up to a 50% of packet drops across different network densities and for different number of attackers, without introducing a significant increase in terms of control overhead. However, the overall performance of the routing protocol is still far from optimal. Thus, in the case of vehicular networks, watchdog nodes alone are not able to completely alleviate these security threats.

Distribution of inter-contact time: An analysis-based on social relationships

Abstract: Communication in delay tolerant networks (DTNs) relies on message transport by mobile nodes, and a correct understanding of the node mobility characteristics is therefore crucial to the design of an efficient DTN routing protocol. However, previous work has mainly focused on uncovering all behaviors of node movement, which is not conducive to accurately detecting the specific movement characteristics of a different node. In this paper, we seek to address this problem based on a consideration of social relationships. We first consider social ties from both static and dynamic perspectives. For a static perspective, in addition to certain accidental events, social relations are considered for a long time granularity and tend to be stable over time. For a dynamic perspective, social relations are analyzed in a relatively short time granularity and are likely to change over time. Based on these perspectives, we adopted different efficient approaches to dividing node pairs into two classes, i.e., familiar and unfamiliar pairs. A threshold approach is used for static social ties whereas a density-based aggregation method is used for dynamic social relationships. Extensive experimental results show that both familiar and unfamiliar node pairs have the same inter-contact time distribution, which closely follows a power-law decay up to a certain point, beyond which it begins to exponentially decay. The results also demonstrate that the inter-contact time distribution of familiar pairs decays faster than that of unfamiliar pairs, whether from a static or dynamic perspective. In addition, we also analyze the reason for the difference between the inter-contact time distributions of both unfamiliar and familiar pairs.