Physical layer security via maximal ratio combining and relay selection over Rayleigh fading channels

In this paper, the impact of both maximal ratio combining (MRC) and relay selection on the physical layer security in wireless communication systems is investigated by analyzing critical issues such as the probability characteristics of the legitimate receiver (Bob) and malicious eavesdropper (Eve)’s end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), the secrecy outage probability and the average secrecy channel capacity over Rayleigh fading Channel, etc. Unlike the conventional physical layer security schemes, we assume that Bob receives its data from both the relay and the source via cooperative relay, provided that MRC is employed at the receiver. Particularly, compared to the conventional MRC methods, the proposed method is capable of achieving a higher spatial diversity order by performing relay selection, as validated by performing the theoretical analysis as well as numerical simulation. Furthermore, the closed-form expressions in terms of secrecy outage probability and average secrecy capacity are all consistent with the numerical results. Finally, the proposed scheme may be substantially affected by a number of parameters such as the number of relays, the SNR of links and the ratio of main-to-eavesdropper ratio (MER) λ_ME.