Comparison of Sum-Rates Achieved by Physical Network Coding

Abstract

We investigate the performance of two-way relay systems by applying practical physical network coding (PNC) schemes. We consider a network consisting of two source nodes and a single relay node, where two source nodes wish to communicate with each other assisted by using relay node. We also consider the relay node which operates with AF protocol. In this paper, we compare the two schemes for two-way relay transmission, named by 2-TS PNC using two time slots and 3-TS PNC using three time slots. Although 3-TS PNC uses more time slots than 2-TS PNC scheme, it facilitates a power allocation at the relay node. It is shown that the 3-TS PNC scheme using an optimal power allocation has better performance than the 2-TS PNC in some relay positions.