Outage performance of decode-forward and amplify-forward protocols in cooperative wireless communication

In this paper, outage performance of Decode-forward (DF) and Amplify-forward (AF) protocols in cooperative wireless communication is evaluated in terms of outage probability. In particular, a new outage analysis for AF protocol has been carried out. Results obtained using this analysis matches with the simulated results. Outage probability analysis helps in deciding whether the targeted quality of service (QoS) is achievable or not. Performance of DF protocol will be better in case of low SNR while performance of AF protocol will be better in case of high SNR. Effect of increase in number of cooperating nodes equipped with single antenna is described, which indicate that as the number of cooperating nodes increases outage performance will improve.