Successive Convex Approximation Research Articles

Optimisation of energy efficiency of ambient backscatter communication and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces in non‐orthogonal multiple access downlink

AbstractThe authors study the energy efficiency (EE) of ambient backscatter communication (AmBC) device‐assisted and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS)‐assisted non‐orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) downlinks. The authors establish two optimisation problems based on the two collaborative devices (AmBC devices, RIS) with the objective of maximising the EE of the system, taking into account the requirements of power limitation and rate limitation, etc. and also obtain the solutions of two problems by optimising the relevant performance metrics based on the alternating optimisation algorithm. For the backscatter device (BD)‐aided downlink NOMA network, the problem is first decoupled into three subproblems, where the power allocation optimisation subproblem is solved by using the quadratic transformation method and the subgradient algorithm. The maximum EE is obtained by iterating according to the Dinkelbach's algorithm. For the RIS‐aided downlink NOMA network, the power allocation problem is solved by the same method as above and the phase optimisation problem is solved by the successive convex approximation method. Numerical results show that the proposed algorithm can achieve convergence after several iterations, and the EE of systems with BD‐assisted and RIS‐assisted have different levels of sensitivity to different influencing factors.

Secure Active Intelligent Reflecting Surface Communication against Colluding Eavesdroppers

An active intelligent reflecting surface (IRS)-assisted, secure, multiple-input–single-output communication method is proposed in this paper. In this proposed scheme, a practical and unfavorable propagation environment is considered by assuming that multiple colluding eavesdroppers (Eves) coexist. In this case, we jointly optimize the beamformers of the base station (BS) and the active IRS for the formulated sum secrecy rate (SSR) maximization problem. Because the formulated problem is not convex, we apply the alternating optimization method to optimize the beamformers for maximizing the SSR. Specifically, we use the semi-definite relaxation method to solve the sub-problem of the beamforming vector of the BS, and we use the successive convex approximation method to solve the sub-problem of the power amplification matrix of the active IRS. Based on the solutions obtained using these stated methods, numerical results show that deploying an active IRS is superior compared to the cases of a passive IRS and a non-IRS for improving the physical layer security of wireless communication with multiple colluding Eves under different settings, such as the numbers of users, Eves, reflecting elements, and BS antennas as well as the maximum transmit power budget at the BS.

A sum‐rate maximization for IRS‐aided broadcast SWIPT with time‐switching structure and nonlinear energy harvester

AbstractThis study evaluates the sum‐rate gain of the intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) in a broadcast simultaneous wireless information and power transfer network. Users are equipped with a time‐switching (TS) structure for an alternating information decoder and a nonlinear energy harvester. The sum‐rate maximization (SRM) problem is formulated subject to the constraints of the energy‐harvesting threshold required by users and limited transmission power at the base station (BS). To address the SRM problem, we jointly designed a broadcast beamforming precoding vector at the BS, reflective phase shifters at the IRS, and TS factors at the users. Subsequently, after certain manipulations, we propose efficient iterative algorithms that combine alternating optimization, successive convex approximation, semidefinite relaxation, and rank‐one penalty function methods to obtain a suboptimal solution. Finally, the numerical results show the promising sum‐rate gain of the proposed scheme compared with the conventional schemes.

Energy-efficient mobile edge computing assisted by layered UAVs based on convex optimization

The utilization of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) as aerial mobile edge computing (MEC) servers presents an effective approach for mitigating the computational limitations of intelligent mobile devices. However, the limited battery capacity of UAVs poses a significant challenge in ensuring sustained service provision. To counter this obstacle and enhance energy efficiency, we introduce a partial offloading MEC scheme assisted by layered UAVs (POAL). Our objective is to minimize the total energy consumption of UAVs by jointly optimizing several factors, including wireless channels, transmit power, task partition, computing power, and UAV trajectories. Due to the non-convexity of the problem, we decompose it into three sub-problems and address them iteratively. Firstly, we employ the CVX optimization tool to allocate wireless channels and utilize Lagrangian duality to determine the optimal transmit power. Secondly, leveraging the monotonicity of the optimization objective, we derive the optimal computing power. Lastly, we employ the successive convex approximation (SCA) technique to tackle the trajectory planning sub-problem. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm can effectively position UAVs within 15 iterations. Furthermore, our layered scheme significantly reduces overall energy consumption.

Low-Resolution Optimization for an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Communication Network under a Passive Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface and Active Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface

This paper investigates the optimization of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) network serving multiple downlink users equipped with single antennas. The network is enhanced by the deployment of either a passive reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) or an active RIS. The objective is to jointly design the UAV’s trajectory and the low-bit, quantized, RIS-programmable coefficients to maximize the minimum user rate in a multi-user scenario. To address this optimization challenge, an alternating optimization framework is employed, leveraging the successive convex approximation (SCA) method. Specifically, for the UAV trajectory design, the original non-convex optimization problem is reformulated into an equivalent convex problem through the introduction of slack variables and appropriate approximations. On the other hand, for the RIS-programmable coefficient design, an efficient algorithm is developed using a penalty-based approximation approach. To solve the problems with the proposed optimization, high-performance optimization tools such as CVX are utilized, despite their associated high time complexity. To mitigate this complexity, a low-complexity algorithm is specifically tailored for the optimization of passive RIS-programmable reflecting elements. This algorithm relies solely on closed-form expressions to generate improved feasible points, thereby reducing the computational burden while maintaining reasonable performance. Extensive simulations are created to validate the performance of the proposed algorithms. The results demonstrate that the active RIS-based approach outperforms the passive RIS-based approach. Additionally, for the passive RIS-based algorithms, the low-complexity variant achieves a reduced time complexity with a moderate loss in performance.

Wireless powered NOMA-based cognitive radio for 6G networks

The need for physically charging mobile devices is anticipated to become a thing of the past in the not-too-distant future. In this paper, a novel approach for wireless-powered mobile devices is presented, which is based on non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) and multi-user multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) antenna systems. The proposed method is specifically designed for use in a cognitive underlay radio (CR) scenario, where the primary network requires a certain quality of service (QoS). Meanwhile, secondary network users can download their data using the same spectrum. The main objective of this paper is to maximize the sum rate of the secondary network. We have optimized a joint beamforming vector for both primary and secondary networks and a time-switching coefficient for energy harvesting and information transfer to achieve this objective. The initial problem formulation was non-convex, requiring the implementation of various techniques to ensure an efficient and low-complexity algorithm. To this end, we employed semi-definite programming, successive convex approximation, and alternating optimization. The proposed NOMA-based solution outperforms the TDMA-based benchmark scheme regarding sum data rate, specifically in the low transmit power region.

Traffic-Aware Energy-Efficient Resource Allocation for RSMA Based UAV Communications

Traffic measurement will play an essential role in future networks to reveal the traffic requirements of the users, which will support network operations like resource allocation. In this paper, we study the traffic-aware resource allocation problem for downlink rate-splitting multiple access (RSMA) based unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) communications. Specifically, with the help of traffic measurement, user requirements on achievable rate are known as prior knowledge to the UAV. Considering user requirements, we maximize the energy efficiency of the UAV by jointly optimizing the UAV deployment, beamforming, rate allocation, and subcarrier allocation. To overcome the non-convexity of the above problem, a joint optimization is developed to solve it iteratively. First, a heuristic approach is proposed to find the three-dimensional location of the UAV. Then, successive convex approximation approach is utilized to optimize RSMA parameters. Moreover, we formulate the subcarrier allocation problem as a many-to-one two-sided matching game, which is tackled by the swap matching algorithm. Numerical results suggest that the proposed subcarrier allocation scheme outperforms benchmark schemes, and RSMA based schemes perform close to that based on non-orthogonal multiple access, which all outperform orthogonal frequency division multiple access based scheme.

Vehicle Selection and Resource Allocation for Federated Learning-Assisted Vehicular Network

To exploit the massive amounts of onboard data in vehicular networks while protecting data privacy and security, federated learning (FL) is regarded as a promising technology to support enormous vehicular applications. Despite that FL has great potential to improve the architecture of intelligent vehicular networks, the mobility of the vehicles and the dynamic nature of wireless channels make the integration of FL and vehicular networks more challenging. In this paper, we propose a vehicle mobility- and channel dynamic-aware FL (MADCA-FL) scheme to fit vehicular networks and enhance learning performances. This novel scheme enables the RSU to select appropriate vehicles and weightedly average the local models. Afterward, MADCA-FL formulates a problem to maximize the model accuracy while assuring the latency and energy restrictions, by jointly optimizing the computation and communication resources. With a mixed- integer non-linear programming structure, the problem is NP-hard. Firstly, we utilize the successive convex approximation algorithm to handle the non-convexity, and then apply the Lagrange multiplier method and the block coordinate descent method to obtain the optimal solution. Extensive experiments are conducted to confirm the effectiveness of our proposed scheme.

Pilot and data power optimization problems in multiple Aerial Relay Stations cell‐free communication systems

SummaryA cell‐free (CF) technology and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) acting as aerial relay stations (ARSs) are gradually viewed as viable technologies for usage in sixth‐generation (6G) wireless networks owing to their outstanding advantages, such as large coverage, uniform service quality, huge connections, flexible deployment in all geographical areas, and high line‐of‐sight (LoS) probability. As a result, the combination of the CF model and UAVs is suitable for densely populated urban areas, shopping malls, festivals, and locations with complex geography. Furthermore, the integration of the CF model and UAV communication can improve system quality and is considered an entirely new research direction as there is no comprehensive investigation of this combined model. In this study, we investigate the quality of the multi‐ARS CF communication system, where ARSs are equipped with multiple antennas and stochastic distribution within a specific region to simultaneously serve numerous ground users. We establish a closed‐form formulation for the uplink and downlink throughput of individual users by using the matched filtering method and conjugate beamforming technology, respectively. Moreover, we propose a novel method to optimize the pilot and data transmission power coefficients for improving channel estimation and increasing throughput per user, thereby ensuring a high quality of service. The power optimization method is executed via the successive convex approximation (SCA) method, second‐order cone program (SOCP), and linear program. We evaluate system performance according to the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of user throughput based on various parameters, such as the number of users, the number of ARSs, and the length of pilot sequences. The analytical findings also reveal that the system with the proposed power optimization method is always superior to the system without the proposed method in both uplink and downlink.

Joint optimization for computation offloading and 3C resource allocations over wireless-powered and NOMA-enabled multi-access MEC

Multi-access mobile edge computing (MEC) enables mobile users (MUs) to offload tasks to proximal multiple MEC servers for fast task processing. Since MUs generally have stringent delay requirements and limited energy and MEC servers have finite communication, computation, and caching (3C) resources, the joint co-design and optimization over computation offloading and 3C resource allocation for wireless-powered multi-access MEC systems have been highly demanded, while having not been well studied yet. We consider a wireless-powered multi-access MEC, where multiple energy harvesting (EH) based MUs and multiple base stations (BSs) each equipped with an MEC server coexist. Each MU first harvests energy from nearby MEC servers, and then offloads its sub-tasks to multiple MEC servers concurrently based on non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA), so as to reduce data offloading delay. We first formulate a delay minimization problem, by jointly optimizing MUs’ computation offloading, MEC servers’ computation and caching resources allocation, and system communication resources allocation. Then we propose an alternating direction multiplier method (ADMM) based distributed scheme to decompose the formulated optimization problem into several sub-problems, and use the block coordinate descending (BCD) method and the successive convex approximation (SCA) method to transform all sub-problems each corresponding to one MEC server to convex subproblems. Finally, we validate and evaluate our proposed scheme through numerical analyses, which show that our proposed distributed scheme can greatly reduce the min–max delay of all MUs by allowing each MU’s concurrent data offloading to multiple MEC servers using NOMA and by jointly optimizing computation offloading and 3C resource allocations. Also, the delay imposed by our proposed scheme is much smaller than that imposed by the Interior Point method, which shows the effectiveness of our proposed scheme.

Enhancing Throughput in IoT Networks: The Impact of Active RIS on Wireless Powered Communication Systems

This paper investigates the potential of active reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS) to enhance wireless-powered communication networks (WPCNs), addressing the evolving connectivity needs of the internet of things (IoT). Active RIS, capable of amplifying and reflecting signals, offers a solution to surpass the limitations of passive RIS, such as double-fading attenuation, aiming to significantly improve network throughput and coverage. Our research focuses on exploiting the amplification capabilities of active RIS to boost the overall network sum throughput, engaging in a comprehensive optimization of critical network parameters, including time allocation, reflection coefficients, and phase shift matrices specific to active RIS. The formulated problem is non-convex and highly complex due to the coupling of optimization variables. We employed a successive convex approximation algorithm to solve the throughput maximization problem by converting the non-convex constraints into approximated convex constraints and solving them iteratively. Through extensive simulations, we demonstrate that our active RIS-assisted network substantially outperforms networks facilitated by passive RIS, marking a significant advancement in WPCN performance. These findings underscore the potential of active RIS technology in realizing the full capabilities of IoT connectivity.

Energy-Efficient Access Point Selection Scheme for Reconfigurable-Intelligent-Surface-Assisted Cell-Free Massive MIMO Systems

Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted cell-free (CF) massive Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) technology exhibits significant potential in enhancing the energy efficiency of 6G mobile communications. Nevertheless, recent studies suggest that both access points (APs) and RISs encounter challenges related to a high energy consumption during operation. To address this issue, strategies involving AP hibernation and RIS shut-off are proposed. Subsequently, an optimization problem is formulated to jointly optimize RISs, beamforming vectors, and AP selection with the aim of maximizing the energy efficiency (EE). Initially, the non-convex optimization problem for maximizing energy efficiency is decomposed into three sub-problems. These sub-problems are subsequently reformulated using fractional programming and variational programming techniques and then solved using the successive convex approximation (SCA) algorithm, Dinkelbach algorithm, and greedy algorithm, respectively. Subsequently, an alternate optimization algorithm based on block gradient descent is introduced to iteratively solve the four-variable optimization problem, thereby obtaining an approximate solution to the original problem. The simulation results demonstrate that the algorithm significantly reduces energy consumption. Specifically, compared to the scheme without the hibernation strategy, the energy efficiency (EE) is enhanced by 35%.

Joint optimal beam forming and resource allocation in intelligent reflecting surface aided wireless power transfer rate splitting multiple access system

SummaryThe intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) has recently become the most promising technology to achieve maximum beam‐forming gain with a simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) system. Many existing studies perform a single IRS deployment or utilize space division multiple access (SDMA) and non‐orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) schemes. However, the existing schemes face high time complexity and block signal transmission for larger indoor communications. Hence, this article introduces a dual IRS‐aided multiuser SWIPT system by implementing rate‐splitting multiple access (RSMA) systems. To enhance the minimum achievable rate and ensure the minimum harvesting energy (HE), this study proposes a joint successive convex approximation with an integrated optimization algorithm (SCA‐IOA). The proposed algorithm jointly optimizes the reflecting beam forming and power splitting (PS) coefficient of all the users effectively. The simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed techniques and produce an outstanding performance for deploying dual IRS and implementing RSMA compared to traditional SDMA and NOMA systems.

Robust Energy Efficiency Optimization Strategy for Emergency Communication Based on Fixed-Wing UAV

<p>The geographic location information of a user serves as the foundation for post-disaster emergency applications. However, uncertainties in the user positioning may arise due to factors such as building obstruction and damage to ground base stations. To ensure optimal communication quality, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) can be implemented to maintain close proximity to the user with a minimal turning radius. However, a small turning radius can result in increased energy consumption due to propulsion requirements. To achieve an optimal balance between high communication throughput and low energy consumption, a robust energy efficiency optimization strategy is proposed based on a fixed-wing UAV, addressing the energy efficiency of emergency communication in imprecise user locations. First, the air-to-ground channel model is established, taking into account UAV propulsion energy consumption and formulating a multi-constraint problem to maximize emergency energy efficiency. Second, by incorporating the circular region method to address location uncertainty and considering the worst-case scenario, a robust problem is formulated. Finally, the worst-case scenario is addressed by utilizing the first-order Taylor approximation and successive convex approximation (SCA) technique to solve the nonconvex problem. Through simulation experiments, the proposed scheme is compared with three benchmark schemes, demonstrating its superior energy efficiency and robustness.</p> <p> </p>

RIS-aided double beamforming optimization algorithm for improving secrecy rate in space–ground integrated networks

The high-frequency band, crucial for supporting the 5G/6G system, faces challenges of signal obstruction by obstacles. This is attributed to significant path loss resulting from radio straightness and short radio distance. To address these challenges, there is a growing interest in leveraging non-terrestrial networks (NTNs) and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs), utilizing high-altitude satellites as base stations or terminals. Within a three-dimensional NTN system, the vulnerability of wireless signals to eavesdropping due to the open nature of the environment is a notable drawback. To mitigate this vulnerability, this paper introduces an algorithm designed to maximize the secrecy rate. The proposed algorithm optimizes security performance by fine-tuning the base station and RIS beamforming vectors. This optimization is achieved through successive convex approximation and minorization–maximization algorithms. Simulation results affirm the superiority of the proposed algorithm in terms of secrecy rate over existing techniques.

Integrated beamforming and trajectory optimization algorithm for RIS-assisted UAV system

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) have garnered considerable research interest in the fields of 5G and 6G wireless communication due to their remarkable flexibility and cost-effectiveness. However, the inherent openness of wireless communication environments renders these technologies vulnerable to eavesdropping. This paper presents a penalty-based successive convex approximation algorithm and a minorize–maximization algorithm to optimize the transmission beamforming vector, RIS beamforming vector, and UAV–RIS trajectory. The objective of this study was to enhance the physical layer security performance of wireless communication systems using UAVs and RISs. Our simulation results demonstrate that the proposed technique achieves a higher security transmission rate compared to existing techniques.

Covert communications in STAR-RIS-aided rate-splitting multiple access systems

In this paper, an simultaneously transmitting and reflecting reconfigurable intelligent surface (STAR-RIS) is deployed in the downlink rate-splitting multiple access (RSMA) covert system to enhance the covert communication performance. According to the RSMA transceiver mechanism, the messages for the covert user (Bob) and public user (Grace) are converted to the common and private streams at the legitimate transmitter (Alice) to realize downlink transmissions, while the STAR-RIS not only assists Alice in transmitting public messages to Grace but also protects the covert messages Alice sends to Bob by mixing up Warden (Willie). To characterize the covert performance of the considered STAR-RIS-aided RSMA (STAR-RIS-RSMA) system, We derive a closed expression for its detection error probability in the most favorable case for Willie, based on which a covert rate maximization problem is formulated. To maximize Bob’s covert rate while confusing Willie’s monitoring, the power allocation factor, common rate allocation factor, and STAR-RIS reflection/transmission beamforming are jointly optimized subject to Grace’s quality of service (QoS) requirements. The complex non-convex problem of maximizing covert rate, involving coupled system parameters, thus is split into three separate sub-issues: the allocation of transmit power, allocation of common rates, and STAR-RIS reflection/transmission beamforming, respectively. To obtain the rank-one constrained optimal solution for the sub-problem of optimizing the STAR-RIS reflection/transmission beamforming, a penalty-based successive convex approximation scheme is developed. Moreover, an alternative optimization (AO) algorithm is designed to determine the optimal solution for the sub-problem of optimizing the transmit power allocation, while the original problem is overall solved by a new AO algorithm. Simulation results corroborate the accuracy of the derived analytical results and demonstrate that the proposed STAR-RIS-RSMA scheme outperforms the benchmark scheme in achieving the covert rate.

User scheduling for non-orthogonal multiple access-enabled 5G aeronautical mobile airport communications system

The recent concept of aeronautical mobile airport communications system with the 5th generation mobile communication technology (5G AeroMACS) for enhancing real-time and efficient flight information transmission has attracted wide attention from the civil aviation industry. In addition, non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is also a promising solution to further improve the sum rate. However, the fundamental limit of the conventional 5G AeroMACS is that, the base station (BS) equipped with dozens of antennas cannot support more users than its number of antennas using the same time-frequency resources. To break this limit, for the first time, we investigate user scheduling policies for the integration of NOMA in 5G AeroMACS, i.e., 5G AeroMACS-NOMA, employing a half-duplex (HD) BS for serving multiple HD downlink users simultaneously. The two proposed user scheduling policies are obtained from the sub-optimal solution of mixed combinatorial non-convex optimization problems for the maximization of the achievable sum rate of the entire system. To mitigate the inter-beam interference (IBI), a user clustering algorithm based on the principle of maximizing the channel spatial correlation is designed, and an iterative power allocation algorithm is utilized for maximizing the achievable sum rate of the entire system. Furthermore, to mitigate the serious error propagation caused by the nature in NOMA, a scenario with user division is considered, and an user scheduling policy based on successive convex approximation is designed to strike a balance between computational complexity and optimality. Simulation results show that the proposed 5G AeroMACS-NOMA schemes can achieve a higher achievable sum rate compared with conventional 5G AeroMACS.

Resource allocation for integrated satellite‐terrestrial networks based on RSMA

AbstractTo achieve high data rate transmission of virtual reality (VR) applications globally, a resource allocation algorithm based on Rate‐Splitting Multiple Access (RSMA) in an integrated satellite‐terrestrial network (ISTN) is proposed. In this network, a user selection strategy is proposed. The maximum transmission power budgets of the base station and satellite, as well as the service quality constraints for all users, are considered. Then, a joint resource allocation problem is formulated. To tackle the non‐convex problem, auxiliary variables are introduced and the first‐order Taylor expansion method is used to convert it into a convex one. An iterative algorithm is proposed based on the successive convex approximation (SCA) to allocate rate and power resources. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm significantly enhances the transmission rate and effectively satisfies the VR transmission rate requirements, when compared to benchmark algorithms.

Enhancing security for physical layer communication in RIS-aided MIMO-NOMA systems in the presence of an eavesdropper

This paper investigates the potential of leveraging a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) in the multiple-input multiple-output non-orthogonal multiple access (MIMO-NOMA) wireless communication systems. In fact, NOMA improves spectral efficiency (SE) through power domain utilization, and RIS enhances the system performance by manipulating the propagation environment. In this paper, we investigate the physical layer security (PLS) of a RIS-aided MIMO-NOMA system serving two users in the presence of an eavesdropper (EV), where the channel state information (CSI) of the EV is unknown for the BS. To address the security challenge, we utilize secrecy outage probability (SOP) and minimize it by optimizing the RIS’s phase shift matrix, the beamforming vector, and the power allocation coefficients. Due to the non-convexity of the main optimization problem, we decompose the initial problem into three subproblems, and then, we propose an iterative approach to determine the unknown parameters alternately. The first subproblem involves obtaining the optimal beamforming vector and phase shift matrix using the semidefinite relaxation (SDR) method, which introduces high complexity. As an alternative, another algorithm is proposed based on the duality of the optimization problem, offering lower complexity and better accuracy for high-dimensional optimization problems. In this algorithm, the successive convex approximation (SCA) technique is employed to achieve the optimum phase shift matrix, and the stochastic gradient (SG) approach is used to determine the beamforming vector. Furthermore, the paper establishes the optimal values of power allocation coefficients by minimizing the difference between the SOPs of the two users. Finally, the simulation results demonstrate that the proposed power allocation coefficients scheme significantly enhances system performance compared to the existing fixed power allocation coefficients scheme.