Abstract
Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS), nonorthogonal multiple access
(NOMA), and underwater optical wireless communication (UOWC) are
paradigms of technologies that drive the development of next generation
communication systems. In this paper, we investigate the performance of
a NOMA-based RIS-assisted hybrid radio frequency (RF) UOWC system. The
ship works as a relay that redirects the received signal to two
underwater destinations simultaneously. Due to the interruption of the
direct link between the base station and the ship floating on the
surface of the water, communication will be carried out via an RIS fixed
to an intermediate building. In this paper, we provide new analytical
expressions for the outage probability (OP), asymptotic analyses of the
OP, and diversity order (D) to gain insights into the system
performance. The results showed that the diversity order depends on the
UOWC receiver detection technique. In the end, we illustrated that the
NOMA-based RIS-assisted system significantly improves the outage
performance of hybrid RF-UWOC systems over a benchmark system.