Emerging technologies such as WiFi and WiMAX are profoundly changing the
landscape of wireless broadband. As we evolve into future generation wireless
networks, a primary challenge is the support of high data rate, integrated multi-
media type traffic over a unified platform. Due to its inherent advantages in
high-speed communication, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)
has become the modem of choice for a number of high profile wireless systems
(e.g., DVB-T, WiFi, WiMAX, Ultra-wideband).
Today’s wireless services have come a long way since the roll out of the
conventional voice-centric cellular systems. The demand for wireless access
in voice and high rate data multi-media applications has been increasing.
New generation wireless communication systems are aimed at accommodating
this demand through better resource management and improved transmission
technologies.
Multi-carrier modulation? Orthogonal Frequency Division Multi-
plexing (OFDM) particularly? has been successfully applied to
a wide variety of digital communications applications over the past
several years. Although OFDM has been chosen as the physical layer
standard for a diversity of important systems? the theory? algorithms?
and implementation techniques remain subjects of current interest.
This is clear from the high volume of papers appearing in technical
journals and conferences.
Since the principle of multi-carrier code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) was
simultaneously proposed by Khaled Fazel et al. and Nathan Yee et al. at the IEEE
International Symposium on Personal, Indoor and Mobile Radio Communications
(PIMRC) in the year 1993, multi-carrier spread spectrum (MC-SS) has rapidly become
one of the most wide spread independent research topics on the field of mobile radio
communications. Therefore, the International Workshop on Multi-Carrier Spread
Spectrum (MC-SS) was initiated in the year 1997. Multi-carrier and spread spectrum
systems with their generic air interface and adaptive technologies are considered as
potential candidates to fulfill the requirements of next generation mobile communications
systems.
Notwithstanding its infancy, wireless mesh networking (WMN) is a hot and
growing field. Wireless mesh networks began in the military, but have since
become of great interest for commercial use in the last decade, both in local
area networks and metropolitan area networks. The attractiveness of mesh
networks comes from their ability to interconnect either mobile or fixed
devices with radio interfaces, to share information dynamically, or simply to
extend range through multi-hopping.
This book is about multipoint cooperative communication, a key technology to
overcome the long-standing problem of limited transmission rate caused by inter-
point interference. However, the multipoint cooperative communication is not an
isolated technology. Instead, it covers a vast range of research areas such as the
multiple-input multiple-outputsystem, the relay network, channel state information
issues, inter-point radio resource management operations, coordinated or joint
transmissions, etc. We suppose that any attempt trying to thoroughly analyze the
multipoint cooperative communication technology might end up working on a
cyclopedia for modern communication systems and easily get lost in discussing all
kinds of cooperative communication schemes as well as the associated models and
their variations.
Emerging technologies such as WiFi and WiMAX are profoundly changing the
landscape of wireless broadband. As we evolve into future generation wireless
networks, a primary challenge is the support of high data rate, integrated multi-
media type traffic over a unified platform. Due to its inherent advantages in
high-speed communication, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)
has become the modem of choice for a number of high profile wireless systems
(e.g., DVB-T, WiFi, WiMAX, Ultra-wideband).
Ultra-wideband (UWB) technology enables high data-rate short-range communica-
tion, in excess of hundredmegabit-per-secondsand up to multi-gigabit-per-seconds,
over a wide spectrum of frequencies, while keeping power consumption at low lev-
els. This low power operation results in a less-interfering co-existence with other
existed communication technologies (e.g., UNII bands).
In addition to carrying a huge amount of data over a distance of up to 230 feet
at very low power (less than 0.5mW), the UWB signal has the ability to penetrate
through the doors and other obstacles that tend to reflect signals at more limited
bandwidths and higher power densities.
Notwithstanding its infancy, wireless mesh networking (WMN) is a hot and
growing field. Wireless mesh networks began in the military, but have since
become of great interest for commercial use in the last decade, both in local
area networks and metropolitan area networks. The attractiveness of mesh
networks comes from their ability to interconnect either mobile or fixed
devices with radio interfaces, to share information dynamically, or simply to
extend range through multi-hopping.
