Energy efficient cooperative communication for UWB based in-body area networks

Abstract

© 2013 ICST 978-1-936968-89-3. In this paper, we study the energy efficiency of single relay cooperative transmission for ultra-wideband (UWB) based in-body area networks (IBANs). A simple relay-based cooperative IBAN system model is introduced first. With a target threshold of the received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), outage probabilities for direct and cooperative transmissions are derived respectively. Afterwards, the average energy consumption per bit is given for both transmission schemes. The optimal relay location for cooperation is also derived and analyzed to minimize the average bit energy consumption. Simulation verifies the analysis and shows that cooperative transmission can achieve a satisfactory improvement on energy efficiency compared with direct transmission over a range of relay locations for UWB based IBANs. The improvement is more significant with a higher SNR threshold or with the implanted sensor having a deeper depth inside the body.