Spectrum Resource Allocation Based on Cooperative NOMA with Index Modulation

In this paper, two novel spectrum resource allocation schemes, based on orthogonal frequency division multiplexing with index modulation (OFDM-IM) and dual-mode OFDM-IM, are proposed for a three-node cooperative non-orthogonal multiple access (C-NOMA) system. In the first scheme, we allocate IM bits to serve the cell-edge user, and save the transmit power to assist the delivery of constellation symbols. Alternatively, constrained by the spectral efficiency (SE), the rest information bits of the cell-edge user can be carried by the conventional signal constellation. In the second scheme, to further eliminate the interference between users and boost the SE, different modulation modes (Mode I and Mode II) are employed to distinguish the subcarriers of the cell-center and cell-edge users, and to encode the incoming bit stream from these users, respectively. Furthermore, we consider two different detectors for the cell-edge user, i.e., the optimal/suboptimal maximum-likelihood detectors. Asymptotically tight bounds on the bit error rate of the above-mentioned users are derived in closed-form. Finally, simulation results verify the theoretical analysis and show that the proposed schemes have the potential to outperform C-NOMA.