Effects of relay position and power allocation in space-time coded cooperative wireless systems

Cooperative communications are effective in improving the performance and extend the coverage of wireless networks. One issue is to find proper methods to allocate cooperative nodes. In this paper we investigate the effects of relay position and power allocation strategy in cooperative communications employing space-time codes (STCs). We consider non-ideal links between source, relay, and destination enabling the analysis of relay allocation problem based on the performance of each link in realistic scenarios. The frame error rate for various channel conditions, available diversity, relays position, and transmitted power levels is obtained. Both the situation of balanced and unbalanced transmit power levels for source, relay, and destination are compared. Cooperative pragmatic STC in block fading channel (BFC) are considered for our analysis. The results provide insights on how to allocate relay nodes based on geometry, link quality, and transmitted power considerations.