On the capacity of cellular fixed relay networks

Augmentation of the conventional cellular networks with wireless fixed relays, to enable multi-hop communications, is being considered for beyond-3G cellular networks in order to provide high data rate coverage in a cost-effective manner. We consider a cellular relay network (CRN) where a large number of low-complexity/low-power wireless fixed relays are deployed around the central node (equivalent of a BS) in each cell. Each relay and central node covers only a small area with a small amount of power, enabling the reuse of the frequency-time resources. The paper evaluates the cell capacity (i.e., aggregate throughput) in the CRN, and compares the cell capacities of the CRN and of the conventional cellular network. The paper shows that the cell capacity of the CRN does not depend on the cell size or the total number of relays in the cell, but it rather depends on the number of nearest relays to the central node.