Wireless communication systems continue to face the challenge of time varying quality of the underlying communication channel. When a slow fading channel goes into a deep fade, the corresponding communication system might face successive decoding failures at the destination, and for delay-sensitive communication systems, this amounts to delays that are not desired. In such situations, it becomes a priority to get out of the deep fades. Many techniques and approaches are already available in the literature to counteract fading effects. This work is motivated by recent advances in fast reconfigurable antennas, which provide new means to change the statistical profile of fading channels, and hence reduce the probability of prolonged fades. Fast reconfigurable antennas are poised to improve overall performance, especially for delay-sensitive traffic in slow-fading environments. This potential enhanced performance motivates this study of the queueing behavior of point-to-point communication systems with reconfigurable antennas. We focus on finite-state channels with memory, and we analyze the queueing behavior of the wireless communication system over erasure channels, for a traditional system versus a reconfigurable antenna implementation. We provide numerical results for situations where using reconfigurable antennas yield substantial performance gains in terms of throughput, delay and buffer overflow.

This dissertation addresses some of the most important issues in delay-sensitive communication over wireless systems and networks. Traditionally, the design of communication networks adopts a layered framework where each layer serves as a “black box” abstraction for higher layers. However, in the context of wireless networks with delay-sensitive applications such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), on-line gaming, and video conferencing, this layered architecture does not offer a complete picture. For example, an information theoretic perspective on the physical layer typically ignores the bursty nature of practical sources and often overlooks the role of delay in service quality. The purpose of this dissertation is to take on a cross-disciplinary approach to derive new fundamental limits on the performance, in terms of capacity and delay, of wireless systems and to apply these limits to the design of practical wireless systems that support delay-sensitive applications. To realize this goal, we consider a number of objectives. 1. Develop an integrated methodology for the analysis of wireless systems that support delay-sensitive applications based, in part, on large deviation theory. 2. Use this methodology to identify fundamental performance limits and to design systems which allocate resources efficiently under stringent service requirements. 3. Analyze the performance of wireless communication networks that takes advantage of novel paradigms such as user cooperation, and multi-antenna systems. Based on the proposed framework, we find that delay constraints significantly influence how system resources should be allocated. Channel correlation has a major impact on the performance of wireless communication systems. Sophisticated power control based on the joint space of channel and buffer states are essential for delaysensitive communications.

Cette thèse explore l’espace communicationnel contemporain à partir de la forme installative. L’enjeu est d’envisager comment dans une société médiatisée où l’exposition est devenue la norme du visible, l’installation parvient à créer ou renégocier dans l’espace social des formes de visibilités. Ces reformulations sensibles proviennent du geste scénographique, tout à la fois processus de création et de représentation, à travers lequel peuvent être circonscrites des « scénographies communicationnelles ». L’installation artistique est l’espace archétypal servant à entreprendre cette réflexion. À partir d’un corpus d’installations artistiques contemporaines, nous analysons les processus par lesquels l’installation conduit à une expérience hétérogène de l’espace tendant favoriser l’immersion du visiteur et le renversement des cadres qui servent à intelligibiliser le réel. Ces processus font de l’installation un espace permettant d’expérimenter le sensible à l’aune d’agencements spatiaux qui en redéfinissent le partage. L’installation peut être conçue comme une forme scénographique constitutive de pratiques et de processus communicationnels tendant s’intercaler entre l’expérience esthétique et l’expérimentation sociale de l’espace. La « communication anthropologique du sensible » favorisée par des dispositifs artistiques de toutes sortes, permet justement d’illustrer comment l’installation, devenue une scène sociale, transforme tout à la fois notre perception et nos modes d’êtres communicationnels. Pour saisir et mettre en perspective ces enjeux à cheval entre les disciplines de la communication et de l’esthétique, cette réflexion prend comme point d’appui l’espace muséal. Le musée, espace scénographié et régime d’exposition matérialisé, permet d’observer comment le paradigme communicationnel intervient dans les pratiques culturelles à travers le rôle que joue l’espace, alors conçu comme une « scène ». L’installation d’abord envisagée dans le milieu typique de l’hétérotopie muséale, sera observée au fil de ses déterritorialisations dans l’espace social, mais aussi à travers des processus circulaires et réflexifs qu’elle provoque sur notre regard. Il s’agit finalement de se demander comment l’installation non plus seulement artistique peut faire lieu de support ou de modèle pour analyser l’espace communicationnel contemporain et plus loin, une hypothétique « société de l’installation ». / This thesis explores the contemporary communicational space on the basis of the installation form. The challenge is to consider how installation manages to create or renegotiate forms of visibilities in a media-orientated society in which exhibitions have become the norm of what is visible. These sensitive reformulations result from the scenography movement, defined as a process of creation and representation through which “communicational scenography” may be contained. The artistic installation is the archetypal space that will be used to undertake this reflection. Using a corpus of contemporary art installations, we will analyse the processes by which installation leads to a heterogeneous experience of space, which typically favours the immersion of the visitor and the reversal of frameworks which serve to make the real world intelligible. These processes make installation a space which allows for experimentation with the sensory experience in relation to spatial layouts which redefine its division. Installation may be appreciated as a form of scenography constituting of communicational processes and practices which tend to insert themselves in between the aesthetic experience and the social experiment of space. The “anthropological communication of the sensible”, promoted by all sorts of artistic devices, illustrates precisely the way in which installation, as a social stage, transforms both our perception and methods of communication. To grasp and put into perspective these issues, which criss-cross between the disciplines of communication and aesthetic, this reflection will focus upon space specifically within the museum. The museum, acting as both a set designed space and a stage of materialised exhibition, makes it possible to observe how the communicational paradigm intervenes in cultural practices through the role played by space, here defined as a “scene”. Initially considered in the typical environment of museum heterotopia, installation will be observed over the course of its derritorialisation in social space, but also through circular and reflexive processes that it may have on our perspective. In the end, it is a question of whether installation, a not only an artistic practice, can act as a medium or a template to analyse the contemporary communicational space and, further still, as a hypothetical “society of installation”.