Practical Non-Linear Energy Harvesting Model and Resource Allocation for SWIPT Systems

• Published in: IEEE communications letters Vol. 19; no. 12; pp. 2082 - 2085
• Main Authors: Boshkovska, Elena, Ng, Derrick Wing Kwan, Zlatanov, Nikola, Schober, Robert
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.12.2015; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Algorithms; Design engineering; Energy harvesting; Integrated circuit modeling; Mathematical analysis; Mathematical models; Nonlinearity; Optimization; Receivers; Resource allocation; Resource management; Wireless communication; Wireless sensor networks; Simultaneous wireless information and power transfer; non-linear energy harvesting model
• ISSN: 1089-7798; 1558-2558
• DOI: 10.1109/LCOMM.2015.2478460

In this letter, we propose a practical non-linear energy harvesting model and design a resource allocation algorithm for simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) systems. The algorithm design is formulated as a non-convex optimization problem for the maximization of the total harvested power at energy harvesting receivers subject to minimum required signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratios (SINRs) at multiple information receivers. We transform the considered non-convex objective function from sum-of-ratios form into an equivalent objective function in subtractive form, which enables the derivation of an efficient iterative resource allocation algorithm. In each iteration, a rank-constrained semidefinite program (SDP) is solved optimally by SDP relaxation. Numerical results unveil a substantial performance gain that can be achieved if the resource allocation design is based on the proposed non-linear energy harvesting model instead of the traditional linear model.