Simultaneous Wireless Information and Power Transfer-assisted Downlink Vehicular Networks

In this paper, we investigate a simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT)-assisted vehicular network. By utilizing the concept of SWIPT technology, battery-operated road-side sensors (RSSs) simultaneously receive control information and harvest energy from cellular base stations (BSs), followed by their communication with vehicles by utilizing the harvested energy. By leveraging stochastic geometry tools, we establish a tractable framework, where the load of BSs and RSSs are taken into account. The analytical expressions for the active probability and average harvested energy of RSSs, as well as the information decoding (ID) success probability of vehicles are derived.  The optimal RSSs' density and time splitting factor that maximize ID success probability are illustrated. Additionally, the optimal sensor density within vehicular networks dynamically adjusts in response to varying traffic congestion levels. These results offer invaluable insights for vehicular network design, highlighting the need for adaptive strategies that seamlessly respond to evolving network conditions and traffic patterns.