Performance analyses of decode-and-forward multi-hop relay network scenarios with multiple antenna techniques over Nakagami-m fading channels

In this study, unified performance analysis of many decode-and-forward multi-antenna multi-hop relay network scenarios is studied over flat Nakagami-m fading channels. The investigated multi-hop relay network scenarios include maximal-ratio transmission, transmit antenna selection and orthogonal space-time block coding techniques as transmit diversity techniques and maximal-ratio combining and selection combining as receive diversity techniques. Performance analysis consists of derivation of outage probability, symbol error probability, moments of end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio and ergodic capacity expressions. In addition, derivation of asymptotic outage probability and symbol error probability expressions is also presented to provide further insight to the performance analysis by quantifying the asymptotic diversity order and array gain. The theoretical performance results are validated by Monte Carlo simulations.