Performance of antenna selection schemes in dual hop full-duplex decode-and-forward relaying over Nakagami-m fading channels

Abstract In this paper, we investigate the outage performance of several antenna selection (AS) schemes in dual hop full-duplex (FD) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relay networks in which the relay adopts decode-and-forward (DF) protocol over Nakagami-m fading channels. In the network, the source (S), destination (D) and relay (R) are assumed to be equipped with multiple antennas. We assume that the line-of-sight component between S and D cannot be established due to the poor fading environment conditions. For signal transmission-reception during the training period, only a single antenna at each node is selected according to selection techniques, and then with the help of an error-free feedback channel the selected antenna index is sent to the related node. Outage probability (OP) expressions related to AS schemes are obtained in closed forms and asymptotic OPs are also derived in order to get more meaningful insights into OP and diversity behaviour. The theoretical results are verified by Monte Carlo simulations. We show that performance of the FD relay can be significantly improved by using selection techniques compared to half-duplex (HD), especially at low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region. In addition, results show that the performance floor level meaning zero diversity at high SNR region, which is also confirmed by asymptotic analysis and is an inherent disadvantage of FD relay, can be decreased. Moreover, it is shown that the FD relay with AS schemes outperforms HD as the target rate increases for a certain value of SNR and residual self-interference power.