Simultaneous wireless information and power transfer for AF relaying nanonetworks in the Terahertz Band

Abstract

A nanonetwork is comprised of nanoscale sensors and communicating devices facilitating communication at the nanoscale, which is a promising technology for application in health applications such as intra-body health monitoring and drug delivery. However, the communication performance within a nanonetwork is substantially limited by the energy loss as the Electromagnetic (EM) wave propagates along the channel. Energy harvesting for nanosensor networks can provide a way to overcome the energy bottleneck without considering the lifetime of batteries. Moreover, relaying protocols for nanoscale communications have been proposed to improve the communication performance and extend the transmission distances among nanosensors within nanonetworks. The combination of energy harvesting and a relaying protocol provides an emerging solution not only to overcome the aforementioned energy issues but also enhance the system performance. Therefore, in this paper, simultaneous wireless information and power transfer nanonetworks in the Terahertz (THz) Band (0.1-10 THz) is proposed. An amplify and forward (AF) relaying nanonetwork in this band is investigated, where the relay harvests energy from the received THz signal which is then consumed to forward the information to the destination. Performance based on both time-switching and power-splitting protocols is analyzed. The numerical results show the optimal power-splitting ratio and time switching ratio that achieves the maximum throughput at the destination as well as the impact of transmission distance on system performance. It is seen that the power-splitting protocol gives greater throughput than that of the time-switching protocol.