Low-voltage broadband power line communication (PLC) system transmits its information by the power line on the existed infrastructure. However, PLC attenuation and its harsh environment make it difficult to establish a reliable communication between the source and destination nodes, and relay-aided (RA) PLC technology can be used to solve this issue to increase the transmission rate and coverage. In this study, an indoor three-hop RA PLC system is under investigation for the first time. Based on a simple PLC attenuation model, the optimal relay node positions and transmitted power distribution of each node are studied to get the best system performance in theory. Then, a criterion of selection optimal relay node positions in a practical power-line network is derived by solving an optimisation problem. Finally, for a specific power-line network, the criterion for the selection of optimal relay node positions at the existed sockets between the source and destination nodes is verified. The theoretical work in this study could be useful in the design of broadband multi-hop RA PLC systems and their engineering applications.

中文翻译：

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三跳低压宽带电力线通信系统的室内中继节点位置选择

低压宽带电力线通信（PLC）系统通过电力线在现有基础设施上传输其信息。但是，PLC衰减及其恶劣的环境使得难以在源节点和目标节点之间建立可靠的通信，并且可以使用中继辅助（RA）PLC技术来解决此问题，以提高传输速率和覆盖范围。在这项研究中，室内三跳RA PLC系统是首次研究。在一个简单的PLC衰减模型的基础上，研究了最佳中继节点位置和每个节点的发射功率分布，从而在理论上获得最佳系统性能。然后，通过解决优化问题，得出了在实际电力线网络中选择最佳中继节点位置的准则。最后，对于特定的电力线网络，验证了在源节点和目标节点之间的现有套接字上选择最佳中继节点位置的标准。这项研究的理论工作可能对宽带多跳RA PLC系统的设计及其工程应用有用。