Relay selection in cooperative networks with frequency selective fading

In this article, we consider the diversity-multiplexing tradeoff (DMT) of relay-assisted communication through correlated frequency selective fading channels. Recent results for relays in flat fading channels demonstrate a performance and implementation advantage in using relay selection as opposed to more complicated distributed space-time coding schemes. Motivated by these results, we explore the use of relay selection for the case when all channels have intersymbol interference. In particular, we focus on the performance of relaying strategies when multiple decode-and-forward relays share a single channel orthogonal to the source. We derive the DMT for several relaying strategies: best relay selection, random relay selection, and the case when all decoding relays participate. The best relay selection method selects the relay in the decoding set with the largest sum-squared relay-to-destination channel coefficients. This scheme can achieve the optimal DMT of the system under consideration and generally dominates the other two relaying strategies which do not always exploit the spatial diversity offered by the relays. Different from flat fading, we found special cases when the three relaying strategies have the same DMT. We further present a transceiver design which is proven to asymptotically achieve the optimal DMT. Monte Carlo simulations are presented to corroborate the theoretical analysis and to provide a detailed performance comparison of the three relaying strategies in channels encountered in practice.