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Covert communications is critical in many application scenarios for ensuring transmission security and privacy. Two-way protocols are widely adopted in intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) assisted relaying networks to enable covert communications and prevent wireless signals from being overheard. To quantify the performance of covert communications in this special scenario, we derive the closed-form expression of outage probability and its asymptote in this paper. Considering the worst-case of covert communications, the optimal normalized power threshold of warden's detector is analyzed under a complex Gaussian distribution approximation. To meet the requirement of the detection error probability, the ratio of the transmission power between the covert nodes is investigated. Simulation results are provided to validate the theoretical expressions as well as the asymptotic analysis with a small number of reflecting elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relay positions or hop distances in a multi-hop relaying scheme is an important parameter that can be optimized in order to mitigate the angle-of-arrival variance or pointing error in a free-space optical (FSO) backhaul link. In this study, we have optimized the relay positions for amplify-and-forward and decode-and-forward relays in a multi-hop unmanned aerial vehicle-based relaying scheme for FSO. Particularly, we have shown that a significant performance improvement may be achieved by optimizing the outage probability as a function of the hop distance for amplify-and-forward relays when the relays are constrained by a finite power gain. Additionally, we have discovered that for a low signal-to-noise ratio channel, the optimal hop distance of a particular hop for decode-and-forward relays is inversely proportional to angle-of-arrival variance in that hop. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Underlay device-to-device (D2D) communication network is becoming a promising solution for the fifth generation (5G) and beyond wireless technology. It exploits the proximity of the D2D pairs and improves the overall network’s latency, capacity, and spectral efficiency by sharing/reusing the existing cellular resources. However, due to the frequency-sharing/reusing, the security of the device users (DUs) and the cellular users (CUs) becomes vulnerable. This paper presents a novel physical-layer security (PLS) scheme for the underlay multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) D2D communications in the presence of multiple eavesdroppers. The proposed new PLS scheme can significantly reduce the information leakage for both CUs and DUs by adopting a null steering scheme at the transmitter. A signal alignment technique is also employed to eradicate the stringent requirement of a larger number of transmitter antennas than that of the receiver antennas. A generalized nonlinear optimization problem has been formulated to improve the PLS performance for MIMO-D2D communications. A closed-form and generalized analytical expression of the secrecy outage probability for CUs and DUs is derived over the imperfect Nakagami- $m$ and Norton fading channels. Theoretical and simulation results of our proposed new PLS scheme have shown significant improvement in the secrecy capacity and secrecy outage probability for both CUs and DUs in comparison with the existing methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unmanned-aerial-vehicle (UAV)-based communications are expected to play an important role in the future generation wireless communication networks. It is a promising solution to enhance the wireless connectivity of devices without infrastructure. As compared to the terrestrial communications, UAVs offer various advantages such as line-of-sight (LoS) connectivity, dynamic deployment and flexible reconfiguration. Further, free space optics (FSO) communication is considered as a possible solution to enable UAV-based communication links due to its cost effective and high bandwidth nature. However, despite offering large bandwidth, UAV-based FSO links are marred by atmospheric path loss, atmospheric turbulence, non-zero boresight pointing errors, and angle-of-arrival (AoA) fluctuations. In this paper, the performance of a hovering UAV-based FSO communication system is investigated. The closed-form expressions for outage probability, average symbol error rate (SER), and ergodic capacity are derived taking into account both heterodyne (HD) and direct detection (DD) techniques for ground-to-UAV (G2U), UAV-to-UAV (U2U), and UAV-to-ground (U2G) links over the generalized Málaga distribution. Moreover, the asymptotic expressions for the above performance metrics are also derived to get the diversity gain of the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we model the multi-layer vertical underwater link as a cascaded channel and unify the performance analysis for the underwater optical communication (UWOC) system using generalized Gamma (GG), exponential GG (EGG), exponentiated Weibull (EW), and Gamma-Gamma ($\Gamma \Gamma$) oceanic turbulence models. We derive unified analytical expressions for probability density function (PDF) and cumulative distribution function (CDF) for the signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) considering independent and non-identical (i.ni.d.) turbulent models and zero bore-sight model for pointing errors. We develop performance metrics of the considered UWOC system using outage probability, average bit error rate (BER), and ergodic capacity with asymptotic expressions for outage probability and average BER. We develop the diversity order of the proposed system to provide a better insight into the system performance at a high SNR. We also integrate a terrestrial OWC (TOWC) subjected to the combined effect of generalized Malága atmospheric turbulence, fog-induced random path gain, and pointing errors to communicate with the UWOC link using the fixed-gain amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying. We analyze the performance of the mixed TWOC and multi-layer UWOC system by deriving PDF, CDF, outage probability, and average BER using the bivariate Fox H-function. We use Monte-Carlo simulation results to validate our exact and asymptotic expressions and demonstrate the performance of the considered underwater UWOC system using measurement-based parametric data available for turbulent oceanic channels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) is regarded as a promising technology to assist indoor millimeter wave (mm-Wave) communication due to its ability to manipulate electromagnetic waves directionally. Due to the complexity of indoor environment, different RIS deployment strategies significantly affect the system performance. However, the existing work investigating RIS indoor deployment ignored the influence of human mobility to indoor signal coverage, therefore a practical indoor deployment strategy remains unknown. In this letter, based on the consideration of human blockage to mm-Wave signal and probability distribution of human location, we propose an indoor RIS deployment strategy with human mobility model to minimize the outage probability, which is more applicable to the realistic indoor environment. An algorithm is presented to minimize the outage probability at a subspace scale of the room geometry and calculate the corresponding RIS location for single RIS deployment and multiple RISs cooperative deployment. Numerical results are provided to display how our deployment strategy works, which indicate that deploying RIS correctly can decrease the indoor communication outage probability significantly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This letter studies a UAV-assisted communication design where a rotary-wing UAV is launched to provide continuous coverage to mobile nodes. We aim to maximize the service time duration of the UAV by optimizing its three-dimensional (3D) trajectory while simultaneously ensuring adequate coverage to mobile nodes. Considering the limited energy available with the UAV, we frame an equivalent energy consumption minimization problem. Though the formulated problem is non-convex, it is shown that it is pseudoconvex under horizontal and vertical UAV coordinates. Based on this observation, we use alternating optimization to solve the problem. Numerical results provide trajectory insight and compare the service duration to the mobile nodes with different schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an efficient and interference-resistant coding technique, multiple description coding (MDC) is proposed with the aim to solve the transmission unreliability problem caused by packet errors, loss or blocking delays. The integration of MDC with non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) scheme (MDC-NOMA) can effectively boost the robustness and throughput of the underlying system. Additionally, space-time block coding (STBC) can further enhance the system reliability with increased diversity gain, as well as reduced decoding complexity. In this paper, we propose a novel framework referred to as MDC-NOMA-STBC, in which we apply Alamouti STBC integrated with MDC and NOMA to implement more reliable transmission. Specifically, NOMA signals are constructed by superimposing the descriptions from different users, then transmitted by the base station (BS) using Alamouti STBC. In order to substantiate the performance of the proposed framework, first, we derive closed-form expressions of both the outage probability and ergodic rate for each user in a two-antenna BS scenario. Second, for multi-antenna BS, we investigate different antenna selection strategies to further enhance the outage performance under the considered framework, whose analytical expression is provided wherever possible. Third, Monte Carlo simulation results are presented to validate our theoretical framework and to corroborate the superiority of the proposed MDC-NOMA-STBC over state-of-the-art MDC-NOMA scheme. Moreover, under realistic contexts with image transmission, it is confirmed that MDC-NOMA-STBC outperforms its counterpart MDC-NOMA in terms of the peak signal-to-noise ratio and the bit error rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) serving a density of ground terminals (GTs) as base stations. The objective is to minimize the outage probability of GT-to-UAV transmissions. Optimal placement of UAVs under different UAV altitude constraints and GT densities is studied. A practical variant of the Rician fading model, which has been developed by Azari et al. (2018) specifically for UAV systems, is used to model the communication channels. First, the structure of optimal deployments is determined when the common altitude constraint is large. For a wide class of GT densities, it is shown that all UAVs should be placed to the same location in an optimal deployment. A design implication is that one can use a single multi-antenna UAV as opposed to multiple single-antenna UAVs without loss of optimality. Next, using a random deployment argument, a general upper bound on the optimal outage probability is found for any density of GTs and any number of UAVs. Further, for any arbitrary user density, centralized and distributed numerical algorithms are designed using particle swarm optimization and modified gradient descent algorithms, respectively. Simulations show that our distributed algorithm provides almost optimal results even with considerably reduced communication and sensing ranges at the UAVs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article establishes an analytical framework for the upper bound on the average Age-of-Information (AoI) in first-come-first-served (FCFS) wireless communications where a certain level of outage probability is unavoidable. To begin with, we analyze the average AoI and derive a general upper bound for G/G/1 systems with a certain outage probability. Subsequently, for an M/M/1 system with the FCFS scheme, we obtain a concise closed-form expression of the upper bound, and further refine the upper bound after analyzing the relative error. Interestingly, it is found by the analysis that the relative error is independent of the service rate, and the upper bound becomes tighter as the outage probability increases. Based on the refined upper bound, we minimize the average AoI for the communications suffering from block Rayleigh fading. We derive a closed-form expression of the outage probability over a fading channel, and then prove that the refined upper bound is a convex function with respect to the average update generating rate. Consequently, we optimize the AoI performance by solving a convex optimization problem formulated utilizing the refined upper bound expression. The numerical results indicate that the minimum average AoI can be reduced by either increasing the service rate or the transmission power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a robust secrecy transmission scheme for intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) aided communication systems. Different from all the existing works where IRS has already been deployed at a fixed location, we take the location of IRS as a variable to maximize the secrecy rate (SR) under the outage probability constraint by jointly optimizing the location of IRS, transmit beamformer and IRS phase shifts with imperfect channel state information (CSI) of Eve, where we consider two cases: a) the location of Eve is known; b) only a suspicious area of Eve is available. We show a critical observation that CSI models are different before and after IRS deployment, thus the optimization problem could be decomposed and solved via a two-stage framework. For case a), in the first stage, universal upper bounds of outage probabilities only related to the location of IRS are derived which can be optimized via successive convex approximation (SCA) method. In the second stage, we develop an alternative optimization (AO) algorithm to optimize beamformer and phase shifts iteratively. For case b), we propose a Max-Min SR scheme based on two-stage framework, where the location of IRS is optimized based on the worst location of Eve. Simulation results indicate the importance of the location of IRS optimization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we investigate the physical layer security for a cognitive multiuser network which is composed of multiple cognitive sources, a cognitive destination and an eavesdropper under the joint impact of hardware impairments (HIs) and channel estimation errors (CEEs). We consider a practical scenario where mutual interference exists between the primary users and cognitive users. To achieve high physical layer security with low implementation complexity, we propose three pure user scheduling schemes, namely, selection combining (SC) scheme, threshold-based switched diversity (tSD) scheme and switch-and-examine combining with post-selection (SECps) scheme. To further improve physical layer security, we present an extension of our SC framework to a jammer aided multiuser network and propose a jammer aided SC (JSC) scheme. We derive the closed-form intercept probability (IP), outage probability (OP) and effective secrecy throughput (EST) expressions for SC, tSD, SECps and JSC schemes over Nakagami- $m$ channels to analyze the system performance. Numerical results show that among the three pure multiuser scheduling schemes, the SC scheme achieves the best secrecy performance with the highest complexity, the SECps scheme obtains the worst secrecy performance with the lowest complexity. In addition, the secrecy performance of JSC scheme is better than that of SC scheme in the high SNR region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) is a promising technology that is anticipated to enable high spectrum and energy efficiencies in future wireless communication networks. This paper investigates optimum location-based RIS selection policies in RIS-aided wireless networks to maximize the end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio for product-scaling and sum-scaling path-loss models where the received power scales with the product and sum of the transmitter-to-RIS and RIS-to-receiver distances, respectively. These scaling laws cover the important cases of end-to-end path-loss models in RIS-aided wireless systems. The random locations of all available RISs are modeled as a Poisson point process. To quantify the network performance, the outage probabilities and average rates attained by the proposed RIS selection policies are evaluated by deriving the distance distribution of the chosen RIS node as per the selection policies for both product-scaling and sum-scaling path-loss models. We also propose a limited-feedback RIS selection framework to achieve distributed network operation. The outage probabilities and average rates obtained by the limited-feedback RIS selection policies are derived for both path-loss models as well. The numerical results show notable performance gains obtained by the proposed RIS selection policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The combination of reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) and non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) has been recognized as a critical method to improve the sixth generation networks performance. In this paper, a distributed RIS-aided downlink multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) NOMA systems with discrete phase shifts are studied, where the channel directions from base station to paired users can be manipulated with the assistance of RISs by employing the concept of signal alignment. In order to ensure base station can flexibly serve some users with NOMA and others users with spatial division multiple access, a unified precoder and decoder are provide to cancel inter-cluster interference. Subsequently, the channel statistics over Nakagami- $m$ fading channels are derived for near and far users. In particular, considering the cascade channel gain may exists two different cases, Beaulieu series is further adopted to characterize their corresponding cumulative distribution function. In what follows, the outage probability and ergodic rate for three situations within one cluster are derived by utilizing the obtained channel statistics, respectively. Based on the derived results, we also analyze the diversity order and high signal-to-noise ratio slope to provide essential insights into the considered systems. Finally, simulation results are presented to reveal that: 1) selecting the setting of 3-bits resolution can realize a near-aligned performance for our proposed systems; 2) the cascade channel statistic caused by RIS can be evaluated with any number of RIS element and any channel gain via Beaulieu series. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) is a key enabler for ultrareliable communications. This paper optimizes transmit power for the initial transmission and the subsequent retransmissions of HARQ with either incremental redundancy or Chase combining, aiming to minimize the expected energy consumption given the target outage probability and the target latency. The main challenge is due to the fact that the outage probability is a complicated function of the power variables which are nested in successive convolutions. The existing works mostly use a classic upper bound to approximate the outage probability by assuming unbounded transmit power, then convert the original problem to a geometric programming (GP) problem. In contrast, we propose a novel and much tighter upper bound by taking the practical power limit into consideration. The new bound and the resulting new GP method are further extended to a broader group of channel models with various fading, multiple antennas, and multiple receivers. As shown in simulations, the GP method based on the new bound significantly outperforms the existing strategies that either fix transmit power or optimize power by the classic bounding technique. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy-aware resource allocation to achieve desired throughput over cooperative power line communications (PLCs) has gained growing interest from past few years. In this article, we design an energy-efficient amplify-and-forward relay-assisted PLC, where outage probability based on energy-efficiency is minimized by jointly optimizing the relay location and power allocation (PA) in two scenarios: 1) absence and 2) presence of the end-to-end direct link. To reduce complexity, using a novel and nontrivial approach, we obtain a closed-form expression of the outage probabilities for both the scenarios. Further, an equivalent problem is formulated to make the optimization problem more tractable to obtain its solution. In the absence of direct link, a closed-form solution of the problem is obtained by the optimization schemes where underlying variables are optimized individually and jointly. While, in the presence of the direct link, a closed-form solution is obtained using a nontrivial tight approximation algorithm. Via numerical results, the outage expressions are validated, and various insights on optimization of PA and relay location are obtained. Finally, with respect to energy-efficiency, it is shown that the joint optimization gives an outage improvement of around 55% and 37% in the absence and presence of the direct link, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Self-energyrecycling (sER), which allows transmit energy reutilization, has emerged as a viable option for improving the energy efficiency (EE) in low-power Internet of Things networks. In this article, we investigate its benefits also in terms of reliability improvements and compare the performance of full-duplex (FD) and half-duplex (HD) schemes when using multiantenna techniques in a communication system. We analyze the tradeoffs when considering not only the energy spent on transmission but also the circuitry power consumption, thus making the analysis of much more practical interest. In addition to the well-known spectral efficiency improvements, results show that FD also outperforms HD in terms of reliability. We show that sER introduces not only benefits in EE matters but also some modifications on how to achieve maximum reliability fairness between uplink and downlink transmissions, which is the main goal in this article. In order to achieve this objective, we propose the use of a dynamic FD scheme where the small base station determines the optimal allocation of antennas for transmission and reception. We show the significant improvement gains of this strategy for the system outage probability when compared to the simple HD and FD schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This letter considers a full-duplex wireless communication system, where two users communicate to each other through an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS). Each user is assumed to be equipped with two antennas, one each for reception and transmission. The system suffers from loop-interference (LI) between the transmit and receive antennas, self-interference (SI) through the IRS, and external interferers (EI) available at the IRS and users. The fading channels are modelled by Weibull distribution as it is a generalized and accurate model for both indoor and outdoor communications. By taking into account the IRS random reflection coefficient (RRC), and by applying the Laguerre expansion approximation, we derive closed-form expressions for outage probability and ergodic capacity. Numerical and simulation results show that LI, SI, EI and RRC have sever impacts on the system performance. The results also show the robustness of the Laguerre expansion approximation compared to non-central Chi-squared distribution, in particular, for a small number of IRS elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose novel reconfigurable-intelligent-surface (RIS)-based energy harvesting (EH) systems with linear EH (L-EH) and non-linear EH (NL-EH) models where channels are exposed to Nakagami- $m$ fading. We also compare two RIS-based EH systems in terms of RIS locations, namely RIS-EH and RIS-information processing (RIS-IP). In the RIS-EH, RIS increases the amount of harvested energy, while in the RIS-IP, RIS is utilized to improve the information processing link. Closed-formed expressions of throughput, outage probability, and average harvested power are derived and confirmed via simulation. The L-EH model overestimates system performance, while the NL-EH model provides a realistic interpretation of EH system design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study the physical-layer security of a hybrid satellite-terrestrial network composed of a satellite, multiple terrestrial decode-and-forward (DF) relays and users in the presence of a terrestrial eavesdropper who attempts to tap legitimate information from both satellite and relays. We consider two different scenarios: I) the channel state information (CSI) of wiretap links is known, and II) the CSI of wiretap links is unknown. Accordingly, optimal and suboptimal relay-user pairing schemes are proposed for the aforementioned two scenarios, respectively. Specifically, a relay-user pair maximizing the secrecy rate is chosen as the optimal one to participate in the transmission, where all links’ CSI is used to perform relay-user pairing. However, suboptimal relay-user pairing scheme is designed only relying on the main links’ CSI without requiring wiretap links’ CSI, where a relay-user pair with the maximal transmission rate of main link is selected. Also, closed-form expressions of secrecy outage probability with both integer and rational fading severity parameter are derived in the case of satellite links undergo Shadowed-Rician fading and terrestrial links subject to Rayleigh fading. Furthermore, asymptotic secrecy outage probability analysis is conducted in the high signal-to-noise ratio region. Numerical results reveal that relay-user pairing is beneficial to further improve physical-layer security of the hybrid satellite-terrestrial network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the performance of an intelligent reflective surface (IRS) assisted non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) system, where the IRS is mounted on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to assist the transmissions from a base station (BS). The BS utilizes the UAV as a relay to serve multiple user equipments (UEs) on the ground. In addition to the IRS relaying links, we also incorporate direct non line-of-sight links between the BS and UEs. We derive the outage probability for this system configuration. Moreover, we obtain a bound of the ergodic spectral efficiency to extract various useful insights. Furthermore, we also compare the performance of the proposed system design against the baseline scheme. Finally, we present numerical results to highlight the benefits of the proposed IRS-aided UAV relaying system and the accuracy of the derived analytical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The outage probability due to polarization dependent loss (PDL) is estimated using the method of threshold exceedances for a multi-channel transmission model that includes i) decision-directed least-mean-square equalization to partially compensate PDL, ii) the dominant fiber nonlinear effects of cross-phase modulation and cross-polarization modulation, and iii) transceiver noise. The outage probability is defined in terms of the bit-wise achievable information rate (BW-AIR) being less than a threshold value for the generalized mutual information determined by the forward error correcting code rate. The root mean square error between the mean excess function and a theoretical fit to it is used for the critical step of determining the threshold below which the BW-AIR data is represented by the generalized Pareto distribution. The applicability of the method of threshold exceedances is demonstrated for 32 Gbaud, dual-polarization 64-ary quadrature amplitude modulation with a uniform constellation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intelligent reflecting surfaces (IRSs) are promising enablers for high-capacity wireless communication systems by constructing favorable channels between the transmitter and receiver. However, general, accurate, and tractable outage probability analysis for IRS-aided multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) systems is not available in the literature. In this paper, we first characterize the distribution of the mutual information (MI) for IRS-aided MIMO systems by capitalizing on large random matrix theory (RMT). Based on this result, a closed-form approximation for the outage probability is derived and a gradient-based algorithm is proposed to minimize the outage probability with statistical channel state information (CSI). We also investigate the diversity-multiplexing tradeoff (DMT) with finite signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Based on these theoretical results, we further study the impact of the IRS size on system performance. In the high SNR regime, we provide closed-form expressions for the ergodic mutual information (EMI) and outage probability as a function of the IRS size, which analytically reveal that the benefit of increasing the IRS size saturates quickly. Simulation results validate the accuracy of the theoretical analysis and confirm the increasing cost to improve system performance by deploying larger IRSs. For example, for an IRS-aided MIMO system with 20 antennas at both the transmitter and receiver, we need to double the size of the IRS to increase the throughput from 90% to 95% of its maximum value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we provide the performance analysis of free-space optical (FSO) communication systems over Fisher-Snedecor $\mathcal {F}$ fading channel with estimation errors in the presence of pointing errors. The probability density function (PDF) and cumulative distribution function (CDF) of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) are derived in the presence of channel estimation errors and pointing errors. Subsequently, the novel expressions for the outage probability, average bit error rate (BER) and ergodic capacity are obtained. The asymptotic expressions for the outage probability and average BER are also presented to provide further insights into the FSO system performance in high SNR regime. Through numerical simulations, the impact of imprecise channel on the performance of the FSO communication systems is analyzed as compared with precise channel. Finally, Monte Carlo simulations are presented to validate the proposed analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we investigate a mobile edge computing (MEC) network, where the user has some computational tasks to be assisted by multiple computational access points (CAPs) through offloading. We consider practical communication scenarios with limited spectrum resources, and the cochannel interference arising from the aggressive reuse of frequency severely degrades the system offloading performance. To enhance the system performance, we provide three CAP selection criteria to choose one best CAP among multiple ones. Specifically, criterion I maximizes the computational capability at the CAP, criterion II minimizes the interfering power, while criterion III maximizes the instantaneous channel gain of data link. In time-varying channel environments, the CAP selection may be outdated, which deteriorates the system performance. For the three criteria, we evaluate the system outage probability in the outdated channel state information (CSI) by taking into account the latency, energy consumption and data rate, and provide the analytical and asymptotic expressions of outage probability, from which we obtain some critical insights on the system design. Simulation results are finally demonstrated to verify the proposed studies. In particular, criterion III under the perfect CSI can achieve the system whole diversity order coming from multiple CAPs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fluid antenna system represents an emerging technology that enables an antenna to switch its physical location in a predefined space. This paper explores the potential of using a single fluid antenna at each mobile user for multiple access, which we refer to it as fluid antenna multiple access (FAMA). FAMA exploits spatial moments of deep fade suffered by the interference to achieve a favourable channel condition for the desired signal, without requiring sophisticated signal processing. We analyze the FAMA network by first deriving the outage probability of the signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) in a double integral form. We then obtain an outage probability upper bound in closed form and an average outage rate lower bound for the FAMA system, with an arbitrary number of interferers, from which the multiplexing gain of FAMA is characterized. We also estimate how large the number of locations is required to achieve a given multiplexing gain using fluid antennas with a given size. Results show that it is possible for FAMA to support hundreds of users using only one fluid antenna of a few wavelengths of space at each user, giving rise to significant gain in the average network outage rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies a convincingly secure transmission framework under an allowable outage probability for practical finite-alphabet inputs, where a full-duplex receiver (Bob) is taken into account to emit the artificial noise for deteriorating the eavesdropper’s decoding performance. We develop a secure-reliable mechanism to take the place of prior secrecy rate (SR) maximization strategy, where a closed form expression is invoked for substituting the non-closed SR expression upon exploiting the multi-exponential decay fitting approach. Hence, the intractable expectation operation over a large number of noise samples is circumvented. Moreover, a pair of critical probabilities of the reliable transmission and secure outage are first analyzed, and then a low-complexity optimization scheme is formulated. Apart from designing the transmission scheme for classically secure networks consisting of a transmitter, Bob and an eavesdropper, we further carry out an investigation on conceiving a secure-reliable strategy against multiple Eves for improving the system’s extensibility. To this end, analytical expressions of both the reliability outage and secrecy outage probabilities for multiple-Eve scenarios are also derived. Furthermore, a pragmatic iterative solution is conceived for addressing the corresponding max-min optimization problem. Finally, the simulation results validate the significance of our considered secure-reliable transmission in terms of the average SR performance attained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this letter, the application of non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) to Terahertz (THz) transmission is proposed in order to mitigate the harmful effect of beam alignment errors. In particular, two types of cognitive radio inspired NOMA (CR-NOMA) schemes are developed to realize different tradeoffs between system performance and user fairness. Both analytical and simulation results are presented to demonstrate the superior performance gain of THz-NOMA over conventional orthogonal multiple access based THz transmission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beamforming based on channel estimation can be computationally intensive and inaccurate when the antenna array is large, while positioning information can reduce the complexity. In this work, we study the outage probability of positioning-assisted beamforming systems. Closed-form outage probability bounds are derived by considering positioning error, link distance and beamwidth. Based on the analytical result, we show that the beamwidth should be optimized with respect to the link distance and the transmit power, and such optimization significantly suppresses the outage probability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this letter, a backscatter communication (BackCom) system with multiple self-powered tags is considered, where in each transmission, the tag that can maximize the received signal-to-noise ratio at the destination is selected to convey the information. To satisfy the tag’s power requirement, the fixed reflection coefficient is adopted. Different from the existing literatures, the effect of the channel estimation error (CEE) on the outage performance is considered. With and without the CEE, the analytical results for the outage probability and the diversity performance under the independent but not necessarily identically distributed Rayleigh fading channels are derived. The numerical results verify the analytical results and then investigate the important parameters on the outage performance. The numerical results show that the CEE and especially the consumed power by tags have a significant impact on the system outage performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efficient connectivity in cellular-connected unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV)s is limited by scarcity of the radio spectrum and strong inter-cell interference (ICI). To address these issues, we propose an aerial-terrestrial network non-orthogonal multiple access (ATN-NOMA) scheme. In this proposed scheme, we pair the aerial user (AU) and terrestrial user (TU) in a NOMA setting to leverage their asymmetric channel gains and rate demands in downlink communications. In ATN-NOMA, the strong ICI issue at the AU receiver is further managed by an elevation-angle based user association, equipping the AU with an adjustable beamwidth directional antenna, and forming a beamforming among the coordinated terrestrial base stations (BS)s. We then obtain the optimal beamwidth and suboptimal power allocation so that the TUs’ sum-rate is maximized subject to the AU’s Quality-of-Service (QoS) requirement. The corresponding optimization problem is non-convex in which we exploit the structure of the problem and apply successive convex approximation (SCA) to obtain a suboptimal solution. We then derive the statistical properties, which consequently enable us to estimate the aggregated ICI. In cases where no interfering BSs have the same elevation angle as the coordinated BSs, we further approximate the AU’s outage probability. We then compare the TUs’ sum-rate and the outage probability of the ATN-NOMA with multiple existing schemes. Extensive simulation results show that our proposed ATN-NOMA scheme outperforms existing schemes by 52-91% in terms of the sum-rate, and its analytical outage probability can be as low as the order of $10^{-17}$. Furthermore, we show that the pairing of AU and TU in multi-cell networks remains beneficial, subject to effective mitigation of ICI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mixture of wireless and power line communications (PLC) is vital for implementing new applications in smart grid and vehicular communications. In this work, we investigate the performance of non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) based dual-hop hybrid communication systems with decode-and-forward relay. The wireless channel is characterized by Nakagami-m fading under an additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN), while the PLC channels are characterized by Log-normal distribution with Bernoulli Gaussian noise including both background and impulsive noise components. New closed-form expressions for the outage probability, the asymptotic outage probability and ergodic capacity are derived and verified via extensive representative simulations. For more insights on the outage performance, we analyze the diversity order. Additionally, we proposed a power allocation optimization technique to achieve an outage-optimal performance. The results show that the system outage probability improves as the impulsive noise index and the arrival probability of the impulsive component of the PLC additive noise decrease, while their effect is negligible on the ergodic capacity. Finally, the performance of the proposed system is compared against a benchmark OMA-based system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ultra-reliable low latency communication (URLLC) requires the packet error rate to be on the order of $10^{-9}$ - $10^{-5}$. Determining the appropriate transmission rate to satisfy this ultra-reliability constraint requires deriving the statistics of the channel in the ultra-reliable region and then incorporating these statistics into the rate selection. In this paper, we propose a framework for determining the rate selection for ultra-reliable communications based on the extreme value theory (EVT). We first model the wireless channel at URLLC by estimating the parameters of the generalized Pareto distribution (GPD) best fitting to the tail distribution of the received powers, i.e., the power values below a certain threshold. Then, we determine the maximum transmission rate by incorporating the Pareto distribution into the rate selection function. Finally, we validate the selected rate by computing the resulting error probability. Based on the data collected within the engine compartment of Fiat Linea, we demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed methodology in determining the maximum transmission rate compared to the traditional extrapolation-based approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With millions of devices connected together, the Internet of Things (IoT) has become an emerging technology for future wireless networks. The ever-increasing number of smart devices and data hungry applications demand a high Quality-of-Service (QoS) for IoT. In conventional networks, data being sent to cloud for computational purpose leads to poor QoS. In order to address QoS challenges, mobile edge networks have emerged as a promising solution. In edge networks, bringing the networks resources closer to the end devices results in improved QoS. The maneuverability and the ease of versatile deployment coupled with cost efficiency makes unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) a promising candidate for future edge networks. The UAVs can act as edge servers to provide computational capabilities and improved services to the edge devices. Due to the flying ability, UAVs can establish better line-of-sight link with the ground devices. In this paper, we consider that the edge devices in the area of interest have to be facilitated with a certain desired QoS, which is based on the notion of outage probability of the wireless link between the UAV and the edge devices. In this context, we first propose a novel method that computes the optimum height at which UAV should hover, resulting in maximum coverage radius with sufficiently small outage probability. Then the geographical area is divided in optimal number of clusters using a novel algorithm based on K-means clustering. The method computes the optimum number of UAVs required for covering the area of interest. Each of the UAVs utilizes 3D beamforming in order to cover its own coverage area. For this purpose, we are taking coordinate transformation of the original area and forming a wide beam to cover the desired area. The obtained results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method when compared to existing methods, which validate the utilization of the proposed method over large scale network applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is considered as a multiple access technique for supporting massive number of devices with high spectral efficiency. Simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) is an efficient solution for fully autonomous and sustainable communication networks. In this paper, application of SWIPT in networks employing cooperative NOMA (CNOMA) is investigated with imperfect channel state information (CSI). Performance of the CNOMA network with SWIPT is investigated in a multi-tier downlink scenario with macro-base stations (MBSs) and femto-base stations (FBSs). The distribution of MBSs and FBSs follow Poisson point process model. Unlike solution in the existing literature, instead of using only the superimposed signal for energy harvesting (EH), in this work, the cooperating node/user employs EH using interference from the adjacent base stations. Expressions for outage probability and throughput are derived at the user pair (comprising a cell-center user and a cell-edge user) served using NOMA. Comparison of the proposed EH system with the existing solutions is highlighted. Monte Carlo simulations are carried out to validate the analytical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications under dense urban environments usually experience severe keyhole fading effect especially for multi-input multi-output (MIMO) channels, which degrades the capacity and outage performance due to the rank deficiency. To avoid these, the integration of MIMO and hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) is proposed to assist V2V communications in this paper. By using the methods of integral transforms, the outage probabilities are derived in closed-form for different HARQ-assisted schemes, including Type I-HARQ, HARQ with chase combining (HARQ-CC), and HARQ with incremental redundancy (HARQ-IR). With the results, meaningful insights are gained by conducting the asymptotic outage analysis. Specifically, it is revealed that full time diversity order can be achieved, while full spatial diversity order is unreachable as compared to MIMO-HARQ systems without keyhole effect. Moreover, we prove that the asymptotic outage probability is a monotonically increasing and convex function of the transmission rate. More importantly, although HARQ-IR performs better than HARQ-CC owing to its higher coding complexity, this advantage becomes negligible in the large-scale array regime. Finally, the numerical results are verified by Monte-Carlo simulations along with some in-depth discussions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we study an intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) assisted non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) network where the direct link between the base station (BS) and one of the users is blocked and the IRS is deployed to serve the blocked user. The IRS designs under both the ideal IRS with continuous phase shifting and the non-ideal IRS with discrete phase shifting are considered. For both cases, by leveraging the isotropic random vector and the Laguerre series, we derive insightful results and closed-form expressions on performance measures including the average required transmit power, the outage probability, and the diversity order. Our analytical results show that the transmit power scales down linearly with the BS antenna number and quadratically with the IRS element number. The diversity order equals the smaller of the BS antenna number and the IRS element number with a scaling coefficient. Our results also reveal the effect of the phase quantization resolution to the system performance when non-ideal IRS is used. Numerical results are provided to validate the accuracy of our analysis and the non-ideal IRS with four or more bits for quantization is shown to achieve nearly the same performance as the ideal IRS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The secrecy performance is analyzed for a two-hop mixed radio frequency (RF)/underwater wireless optical communication (UWOC) system using a decode-and-forward (DF) relay. All RF and UWOC links are modeled by the $\alpha -\mu $ and exponential-generalized Gamma distributions, respectively. We first derive the expressions of a lower bound of secrecy outage probability in closed-form, and these expressions are used to derive asymptotic expressions in simple functions at high signal-to-noise ratio. Moreover, based on the asymptotic expressions, we can numerically determine a suboptimal transmit power for a wide variety of RF and UWOC channel conditions. All analyses are validated using Monte Carlo simulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this letter, performance of a multiantenna multiuser unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted terrestrial-satellite communication system over mixed free space optics (FSO)/radiofrequency (RF) channels is analyzed. Downlink transmission from the satellite to the UAV is completed through FSO link which follows gamma–gamma distribution with pointing error impairments. Both the heterodyne detection and intensity modulation direct detection techniques are considered at the FSO receiver. To avail the antenna diversity, multiple transmit antennas are considered at the UAV. Selective decode-and-forward scheme is assumed at the UAV and opportunistic user scheduling is performed while considering the practical constraints of outdated channel state information (CSI) during the user selection and transmission phase. The RF links are assumed to follow Nakagami-m distribution due to its versatile nature. In this context, for the performance analysis, analytical expressions of outage probability, asymptotic outage probability, ergodic capacity, effective capacity, and generalized average symbol-error-rate expressions of various quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) schemes such as hexagonal-QAM, cross-QAM, and rectangular QAM are derived. A comparison of various modulation schemes is presented. Further, the impact of pointing error, number of antennas, delay constraint, fading severity, and imperfect CSI are highlighted on the system performance. Finally, all the analytical results are verified through the Monte–Carlo simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Optical wireless communication (OWC) over atmospheric turbulence and pointing errors is a well-studied topic. Still, there is limited research on signal fading due to random fog in an outdoor environment for terrestrial wireless communications. In this paper, we analyze the performance of a decode-and-forward (DF) relaying under the combined effect of random fog, pointing errors, and atmospheric turbulence with a negligible line-of-sight (LOS) direct link. We consider a generalized model for the end-to-end channel with independent and not identically distributed (i.ni.d.) pointing errors, random fog with Gamma distributed attenuation coefficient, double generalized gamma (DGG) atmospheric turbulence, and asymmetrical distance between the source and destination. We develop density and distribution functions of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) under the combined effect of random fog, pointing errors, and atmospheric turbulence (FPT) channel and distribution function for the combined channel with random fog and pointing errors (FP). Using the derived statistical results, we present analytical expressions of the outage probability, average SNR, ergodic rate, and average bit error rate (BER) for both FP and FPT channels in terms of OWC system parameters. We also develop simplified and asymptotic performance analysis to provide insight on the system behavior analytically under various practically relevant scenarios. We demonstrate the mutual effects of channel impairments and pointing errors on the OWC performance, and show that the relaying system provides significant performance improvement compared with the direct transmissions, especially when pointing errors and fog becomes more pronounced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we consider downlink low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication systems where multiple LEO satellites are uniformly distributed over a sphere at a certain altitude according to a homogeneous binomial point process (BPP). Based on the characteristics of the BPP, we analyze the distance distributions and the distribution cases for the serving satellite. We analytically derive the exact outage probability, and its approximated expression is obtained using the Poisson limit theorem. With these derived expressions, the system throughput maximization problem is formulated under the satellite-visibility and outage constraints. To solve this problem, we reformulate it with bounded feasible sets and propose an iterative algorithm to obtain near-optimal solutions. Simulation results perfectly match the derived exact expressions for the outage probability and system throughput. The analytical results of the approximated expressions are fairly close to those of the exact ones. It is also shown that the proposed algorithm for the throughput maximization is very close to the optimal performance obtained by a two-dimensional exhaustive search. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) is a promising technology to enhance the coverage and performance of wireless networks. We consider the application of IRS to non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA), where a base station transmits superposed signals to multiple users by the virtue of an IRS. The performance of an IRS-assisted NOMA networks with imperfect successive interference cancellation (ipSIC) and perfect successive interference cancellation (pSIC) is investigated by invoking 1-bit coding scheme. In particular, we derive new exact and asymptotic expressions for both outage probability and ergodic rate of the $m$ -th user with ipSIC/pSIC. Based on analytical results, the diversity order of the $m$ -th user with pSIC is in connection with the number of reflecting elements and channel ordering. The high signal-to-noise radio (SNR) slope of ergodic rate for the $m$ -th user is obtained. The throughput and energy efficiency of IRS-NOMA networks are discussed both in delay-limited and delay-tolerant transmission modes. Additionally, we derive new exact expressions of outage probability and ergodic rate for IRS-assisted orthogonal multiple access (IRS-OMA). Numerical results are presented to substantiate our analyses and demonstrate that: i) The outage behaviors of IRS-NOMA are superior to that of IRS-OMA and relaying schemes; ii) The $M$ -th user has a larger ergodic rate than IRS-OMA and benchmarks. However, the ergodic performance of the $m$ -th user exceeds relaying schemes in the low SNR regime; and iii) The IRS-assisted NOMA networks have ability to achieve the enhanced energy efficiency compared to conventional cooperative communications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an important technique of enabling global access for 6G, low earth orbit satellite (LEO-Sat) communication is still facing the challenges of large path-loss, and severe Doppler effect. This paper studies the reliability performance of a downlink LEO-Sat communication system, where the orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) scheme is employed to combat severe Doppler effect. Further, the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) based cooperative transmission is developed, in order to compensate for the large margin of path-loss caused by the long transmission distance. In particular, the closed-form expression for the outage probability of the OTFS based LEO-Sat transmission is derived, where the novel moment matching approach is used to closely approximate the PDF of a sum of shadowing Rician (SR) variables. Further, the condition of using UAV cooperation is obtained so that the positive reliability gain is guaranteed. Finally, both the theoretical analysis and simulation results show that, the OTFS scheme can significantly outperform the traditional OFDM scheme, while demanding to carefully address the trade-off between reliability improvement and implementation complexity determined by modulation size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given its ability to control and manipulate wireless environments, reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS), also known as intelligent reflecting surface (IRS), has emerged as a key enabler technology for the six-generation (6G) cellular networks. In the meantime, vehicular environment radio propagation is negatively influenced by a large set of objects that cause transmission distortion such as high buildings. Therefore, this work is devoted to explore the area of RIS technology integration with vehicular communications while considering the dynamic nature of such communication environment. Specifically, we provide a system model where RoadSide Unit (RSU) leverages RIS to provide indirect wireless transmissions to disconnected areas, known as dark zones. Dark zones are spots within RSU coverage where the communication links are blocked due to the existence of blockages. In details, a discrete RIS is utilized to provide communication links between the RSU and the vehicles passing through out-of-service zones. Therefore, the joint problem of RSU resource scheduling and RIS passive beamforming or phase-shift matrix is formulated as an optimization problem with the objective of maximizing the minimum average bit rate. The formulated problem is mixed integer non-convex program which is difficult to be solved and does not account for the uncertain dynamic environment in vehicular networks. Thereby, we resort to alternative methods based on Deep Reinforcement Learning to determine RSU wireless scheduling and Block Coordinate Descent (BCD) to solve for the phase-shift matrix, i.e., passive beamforming, of the RIS. The Markov Decision Process (MDP) is defined and the complexity of the solution approach is discussed. Our numerical results demonstrate the superiority of our proposed approach over baseline techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A hybrid satellite-terrestrial relay network (HSTRN) has been envisioned as a promising communication architecture for future wireless communications, which can prominently reduce the impact of shadow fading and expand service coverage. In this paper, we conduct theoretical performance analysis for a dual-hop communication system, consisting of multiple relays and multiple users in the HSTRN with the amplify-and-forward protocol. For the shadowing effect and the multipath effect, we introduce the shadowed-Rician distribution and Nakagami- $m$ fading to characterize the channel models for the satellite-relay and the relay-user links, respectively. Additionally, the opportunistic scheduling scheme is employed, where the optimal relay and the optimal user are selected from the alternative nodes with the maximum instantaneous signal-to-noise ratio. Thereafter, the analytical expressions including ergodic capacity and average symbol error rate (SER) are derived. More specifically, we also present the asymptotic behavior of the average SER at the high signal-to-noise ratio (SRN) regime. The theoretical analysis is validated by the numerical results. Moreover, the results also reveal that the performance of the system can be improved by increasing the number of relays and users under different channel parameters and various modulation schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the performance of a new framework for low-outage downlink non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) using a coordinated direct and relay transmission (CDRT) scheme with direct links to both the near-user (NU) and the far-user (FU). Both amplify-and-forward and decode-and-forward relays are considered. In this framework, the NU combines the signals from base-station and relay at each stage of the successive interference cancellation (SIC) to attain good outage performance. For both NU and FU, the expressions for outage probability and throughput are derived in closed form. We also derive the high-SNR expressions for the outage probability to demonstrate that with the proposed framework, both users harness a diversity of two without feedback bits (this is the only framework to achieve this). We demonstrate that the choice of power allocation coefficient and target symbol rates is crucial to maximizing the NU throughput while ensuring a desired target FU throughput. We demonstrate that CDRT with the proposed framework outperforms known schemes in terms of outage probability, sum throughput, and energy efficiency. Moreover, we also show that optimal rate selection is important to maximize the energy efficiency. Monte Carlo simulations validate the accuracy of the derived analytical expressions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploiting short packets for communications is one of the key technologies for realizing emerging application scenarios such as massive machine type communications (mMTC) and ultra-reliable low-latency communications (uRLLC). In this paper, we investigate short-packet communications to provide both reliability and security guarantees simultaneously with an eavesdropper. In particular, an outage probability considering both reliability and secrecy is defined according to the characteristics of short-packet transmission, while the effective throughput in the sense of outage is established as the performance metric. Specifically, a general analytical framework is proposed to approximate the outage probability and effective throughput. Furthermore, closed-form expressions for these quantities are derived for the high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime. Both effective throughput obtained via a general analytical framework and a high-SNR approximation are maximized under an outage-probability constraint by searching for the optimal blocklength. Numerical results verify the feasibility and accuracy of the proposed analytical framework, and illustrate the influence of the main system parameters on the blocklength and system performance under the outage-probability constraint. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a covert wireless uplink transmission strategy in space-air-ground integrated vehicular networks, where the source vehicle transmits its own message over the channel that being used by the host communication system, to avoid being detected by the warden. It is obvious that the data transmission efficiency of the covert communication system is limited due to the co-channel interference. To improve the data transmission efficiency, we consider that the covert communication system adopts improper Gaussian signaling (IGS). We formulate a joint transmit power and IGS factor optimization problem to minimize the outage probability of the covert communication system. The minimum error detection probability of the warden is first analyzed with noise uncertainty, which is used to measure the system covertness. Under the constraints of the quality of service (QoS) of host communication system and the covertness requirement, the optimal transmit power is first derived with proper Gaussian signaling (PGS) scheme. Then, with the approximate outage probability derived under IGS scheme, the optimization problem is solved by jointly designing the transmit power and IGS factor. Finally, we provide extensive numerical results to validate the proposed covert transmission strategy, and demonstrate that the IGS scheme is beneficial in improving the data transmission efficiency in terms of outage probability compared to PGS scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]