This thesis focuses on designing wireless cooperative communication strategies that are
either optimal or near-optimal in terms of the tradeoff between diversity and multiplexing
gains. Starting from classical cooperative broadcast, multiple-access and relay channels
with unit degree of freedom, to more general cooperative interference channels with
higher degrees of freedom, properties of different network topologies are studied and
their unique characteristics together with several advanced interference management
techniques are exploited to design cooperative transmission strategies in order to enhance
data rate, reliability or both at the same time. Moreover, various algorithms are
proposed to solve practical implementation issues and performance is analyzed through
both theoretical verifications and simulations.