Optimal receiver design for diffusive molecular communication with flow and additive noise

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Communication Systems
• Information Theory

Background:

• Molecular communication (MC) systems offer a promising paradigm for nanoscale applications.
• Existing MC receiver designs face challenges due to environmental factors like flow and interference.
• Intersymbol interference (ISI) is a significant hurdle in achieving reliable molecular communication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To design and evaluate advanced receivers for diffusive molecular communication.
• To incorporate realistic environmental factors including flow, additional molecule sources, and enzymes.
• To analyze the trade-offs between detector complexity and bit error probability.

Main Methods:

• Characterization of mutual information for receiver observations.
• Derivation of the maximum likelihood sequence detector (MLSD) for a lower bound on bit error probability.
• Proposal and analysis of weighted sum detectors (WSDs) for practical implementation.

Main Results:

• Mutual information analysis reveals the potential for independent receiver observations.
• MLSD provides a theoretical lower bound for bit error probability.
• Weighted sum detectors demonstrate a practical approach with derived expected bit error probabilities.
• Optimal WSD performance can match a matched filter under specific conditions.
• Simulations highlight the complexity-performance trade-off and the positive impact of slow flow on WSD performance.

Conclusions:

• The proposed receiver designs and detectors enhance reliability in diffusive molecular communication.
• Weighted sum detectors offer a practical and effective solution for mitigating ISI.
• Environmental flow, even slow, can be leveraged to improve receiver performance.