A case for amplify-forward relaying in the block-fading multiple-access channel

This correspondence demonstrates the significant gains that multiple-access users can achieve from sharing a single amplify-forward relay in slow-fading environments. The proposed protocol, namely, multiple-access amplify-forward (MAF), allows for a low-complexity relay and achieves the optimal diversity-multiplexing tradeoff (DMT) at high multiplexing gains. Analysis of the protocol further reveals that it outperforms both the compress-forward strategy at low multiplexing gains and the dynamic decode-forward protocol at high multiplexing gains. An interesting feature of the proposed protocol is that, at high multiplexing gains, it resembles a multiple-input single-output (MISO) system, and at low multiplexing gains, it provides each user with the same DMT as if there were no contention for the relay from the other users.