Topics in multi-terminal wireless networks

In this dissertation, tools from information theory are used to study multiterminal wireless networks. A compress-and-forward scheme with layered decoding is presented for the unicast and multi-source wireless network and shown to be approximately optimal. This scheme is shown to allow better decoding complexity compared to previously known approximately optimal schemes. Characterizing the layered decoding scheme is shown to be equivalent to characterizing an information flow for the wireless network. A node-flow for a graph with bisubmodular capacity constraints is presented and a max-flow min-cut theorem is presented. This generalizes many well-known results of flows over capacity constrained graphs studied in computer science literature. In the final part of the dissertation, the intuitions from the reciprocal nature of networks are used to present an approximately optimal communication scheme for broadcast networks, which are the reciprocal of the multi-source wireless networks.