On the performance of a relay assisted hybrid RF-NLOS UVC system with imperfect channel estimation

Non-line-of-sight (NLOS) ultraviolet communication (UVC) is emerging as an attractive optical wireless communication technology that enables wireless connectivity in radio-frequency (RF) prohibited areas with no LOS availability. NLOS UVC, however, suffers from a very high path loss, thereby restricting its usage to smaller link distances. In this paper, we address the challenge of providing long-distance wireless connectivity to RF prohibited areas by mixing NLOS UVC with RF communication using a decode-and-forward relay. The RF link is modeled using Rayleigh distribution, and the NLOS UV link is modeled using lognormal distribution under weak turbulence conditions. A framework for analytical expressions of the outage probability and probability density function (PDF) of the end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio is presented by considering the practical scenario of imperfect channel state information (CSI) at the receiver. Subsequently, a PDF based novel closed-form analytical expression of the average symbol error rate is deduced for spectrally efficient higher-order modulation schemes, including rectangular quadrature modulation (RQAM), square QAM (SQAM), cross-QAM (XQAM), and hexagonal QAM (HQAM). Numerical investigations are conducted, and the impact of CSI imperfections on the system performance is evaluated. It is shown that the RF link is more vulnerable to channel estimation error (CEE) than the NLOS UV link. Further, it is illustrated that for constellation sizes greater than four, HQAM always performs better than the RQAM, SQAM, and XQAM schemes, irrespective of the amount of CEE present. Furthermore, it is shown that an elevation angle of 70° or less in the NLOS UVC link results in better outage performance. Correctness of the derived analytical expressions is supported through extensive Monte Carlo simulations