Simplified Semi-Blind Channel Estimation for Space–Time Coded MIMO-OFDM Systems

The combination of Space–Time Coded Multiple Input Multiple Output systems (STC-MIMO) with Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is recently being investigated as an effective means of providing high-speed data transmission over dispersive wireless channels. The strengths of the two techniques coalesce and render MIMO-OFDM systems robust to ISI and IBI. However, the decoding and demodulation of STC-OFDM needs reliable channel knowledge at the receiver, unless differential modulation techniques are used. Semi-blind methods for channel estimation are seen to provide the best trade-off in terms of bandwidth overhead, computational complexity and latency. The conventional Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm for semi-blind channel estimation improves a pilot-based estimate with a two step process; however, it is computationally complex to implement. In this paper, we propose a variant of the EM method, referred to as ML-EM, for semi-blind estimation of doubly dispersive channels in space–time coded MIMO-OFDM systems. Here, the conventional EM algorithm is coupled with the ML decoder for space time block codes (STBCs). The technique shows good performance, even in highly correlated antenna arrays, and is computationally simpler than conventional EM. The method incurs a training overhead of less than 1%, and performs close to exact CSI through iterative processing at the receiver.     

Performance Analysis of Rate-Adaptive Modulation with Imperfect Estimation in Space?CTime Coded MIMO System

Based on the imperfect estimation information, the performance analysis of multi-input multi-out (MIMO) systems with rate-adaptive modulation and space?Ctime coding over flat Rayleigh fading channels is presented in this paper. The fading gain value is partitioned into a number of regions by which the modulation is adapted according to the region the fading gain falls in. Under a target bit error rate (BER) and constant power constraint, the fading gain region boundaries are given. By utilizing the minimum mean squared error estimation, the correlation between the channel gains and their estimates, which contributes to imperfect channel information, is evaluated. With this correlation, the probability density function of fading gain is obtained. Based on these results, the closed-form expressions for the SE and average BER are derived in detail, respectively. The theoretical expressions will be more accurate than the existing schemes, and they include perfect estimation as a special case. Numerical results show that the SE and BER of the system with imperfect estimation are worse than those with perfect estimation due to the estimation error. Moreover, the simulation results for SE and BER are in good agreement with the theoretical analysis.     

Predicting Approximate Performance Bounds for Space–Time Codes Over Quasi-Static Fading Channels

This paper provides a useful method for predicting the approximate performance of space time codes over quasi-static fading channels. Based on evaluating the signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) of the extrinsic information in the minimum mean-square error (MMSE) detector, we obtain upper and lower bounds on SNR, which are the convergent limits of the SNR evolution of the extrinsic information between the MMSE detector and the a posteriori probability decoder. Based on the SNR bounds the upper and lower bounds of frame-error-rate and bit-error-rate can be assessed by averaging over the fading coefficients. The results of numerical simulations are found to be in excellent agreement with the semi-analytic bounds.     

Space–Time/Space–Frequency/Space–Time–Frequency Block Coded MIMO-OFDM System with Equalizers in Quasi Static Mobile Radio Channels Using Higher Tap Order

In 4G broadband wireless communications, multiple transmit and receive antennas are used to form multiple input multiple output (MIMO) channels to increase the capacity (by a factor of the minimum number of transmit and receive antennas) and data rate. In this paper, the combination of MIMO technology and orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems is analyzed for wideband transmission which mitigates the intersymbol interference and hence enhances system capacity. In MIMO-OFDM systems, the coding is done over space, time, and frequency domains to provide reliable and robust transmission in harsh wireless environment. Also, the performance of space time frequency (STF) coded MIMO-OFDM is analyzed with space time and space frequency coding as special cases. The maximum achievable diversity of STF coded MIMO-OFDM is analyzed and bit error rate performance improvement is verified by simulation results. Simulations are carried out in harsh wireless environment, whose effect is mitigated by using higher tap order channels. The complexity is resolved by employing sphere decoder at the receiver.     

Performance Analysis and Optimal Power Allocation for Space–Time and Amplify-and-Forward Cooperative System

In this paper, we consider a space?Ctime and amplify-and-forward (ST-AF) cooperative system which consists of two-antenna source, single-antenna relay and destination. Source transmits Alamouti space?Ctime coding symbols to destination with cooperation of relay which adopts AF strategy. Closed-form symbol error rate (SER) is derived for the ST-AF system with PSK signals. Moreover, a SER approximation is developed to show the asymptotic performance of the ST-AF cooperative system in medium and high SNR regimes. For comparison, the SER approximation of another cooperative space?Ctime coding (C-STC) scheme is also derived. Theoretical analysis shows that the ST-AF can obtain more diversity gain and achieve higher diversity order than C-STC. Statistical optimal power allocation (OPA) algorithm for the ST-AF cooperative system is presented based on the SER performance. It turns out the OPA only depends on the channel links related to the relay, not depend on the direct link between source and destination. Finally, numerical simulations validate the theoretical analysis.     

Performance Analysis of Joint Relay and Transmit–Receive Antenna Selection for Low Density Parity Check-Asynchronous Distributed Space Time Block Coded Cooperative Diversity System

In this work we propose a joint relay and transmit–receive antenna selection method for amplify and forward asynchronous distributed space time block coded (ADSTBC) system. To the LDPC coded signal received from the source at the relays, we apply linear dispersion codes which are optimized over the delay profile of the system to produce the ADSTBC. Selection of the best transmit–receive antenna pair between source and selected relays, and that of between the selected relays and destination is done on the basis of instantaneous signal to noise ratio (SNR) of the respective paths. The relays and transmit-receive antenna pairs are selected by maximizing the end-to-end instantaneous SNR. Performance analysis of the system is done on the basis of pair wise error probability and outage probability (P_out).     

Performance of Layered Steered Space–Time Codes in Wireless Systems

Layered Steered Space–Time Codes (LSSTC) is a recently proposed multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system that combines the benefits of vertical Bell Labs space–time (VBLAST) scheme, space–time block codes (STBC) and beamforming. In this paper, we derive the error performance and capacity of a single-user LSSTC system. The analysis is general enough to any layer ordering and modulation schemes used. In addition, the derived analysis is general for any LSSTC structure in which layers may have different number of antenna arrays and may be assigned power according to any power allocation. Furthermore, we analytically investigate the tradeoff between the main parameters of the LSSTC system, i.e., diversity, multiplexing and beamforming. Our results give recursive expressions for the probability of error for LSSTC which showed nearly perfect match to the simulation results. Results have also revealed the possibility of designing an adaptive system in which it was shown that combining beamforming, STBC, and VBLAST has better performance than VBLAST at high SNR range.     

A Novel Adaptive Optimized Fast Blind Channel Estimation for Cyclic Prefix Assisted Space–Time Block Coded MIMO-OFDM Systems

In this paper an adaptive optimized fast blind channel estimation using cyclic prefix supported with Space Time Block Coded Multiple Input Multiple Output Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (STBC-MIMO-OFDM) system is presented. The main aspire of our technique is to support multiple users at the same time over same frequency band based on the Multi-Carrier Code-Division Multiple Access (MC-CDMA) approach. High complexity and low convergence is the main obstacle in earlier blind channel estimation techniques. Modified flower pollination algorithm is implemented to overcome this problem. The MC-CDMA approach is utilized to implement the blind channel estimation. The proposed MC-CDMA is used to reduce the error rate included in the Blind Channel Estimation. As a part of wireless communications, time block coding technique is utilized to transmit several copies of information across the number of antennas. To develop the consistency of data transfer different received data is used and then MFPA results in lower fuel cost compared to FPA. MFPA produces better results compared with previous methods.

     

Efficient Decoding for Generalized Quasi-Orthogonal Space–Time Block Codes

Space–time coding can achieve transmit diversity and power gain over spatially uncoded systems without sacrificing bandwidth. There are various approaches in coding structures, including space–time block codes. A class of space–time block codes namely quasi-orthogonal space–time block codes can achieve the full rate, but the conventional decoders of these codes experience interference terms resulting from neighboring signals during signal detection. The presence of the interference terms causes an increase in the decoder complexity and a decrease in the performance gain. In this article, we propose a modification to the conventional coding/decoding scheme that will improve performance, reduce decoding complexity, and improve robustness against channel estimation errors as well.     

Performance Evaluation of Space–Time Block Codes Over Keyhole Weibull Fading Channels

It is well known that degenerate channel phenomena known as keyholes may significantly reduce the capacity of multiple-input and multiple-output (mimo) channels. Keyhole mimo channels were predicted theoretically and also observed experimentally. In this paper, a novel method of analyzing the performance of keyhole mimo channels is proposed. The proposed method is based on the assumption that the received signal at the keyhole encompasses an arbitrary number of multipath components and the propagation environment is such that the resulting signal is observed as a non-linear function of the modulus of the sum of these components. Based on this assumption, we initially introduce the double Weibull fading model, constructed by the product of two independent Weibull distributed fading envelopes. Closed-form expressions for its moments-generating function, probability density function, cumulative distribution function, and moments are also derived. Based on these formulas, we analytically evaluate the performance of a 2 × 2 mimo space–time block-coding (stbc) system, where performance metrics such as the average symbol error probability for several modulation schemes, outage probability, amount of fading and ergodic capacity are given in closed form. Various performance evaluation results are presented in order to verify the proposed analysis.

Block Diagonal Differential Space–Time–Frequency Codes for Four Transmit Antennas

For Multiple Input Multiple Output-Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) system with four transmit antennas, this paper presents a novel block diagonal differential space–time–frequency (DSTF) coded scheme with full diversity and rate one. It overcomes the rate loss of the traditional differential orthogonal space–time–frequency coded scheme for four transmit antennas. The coding and decoding method are described in detail. After analyzing the system error performance, this paper provides two measures to improve the system error performance. One measure is to design good codes which achieve large coding gain. Thus, linear constellation decimation (LCD) codes are imported. The optimal decimation factors are given in the Table 1 under different design parameters. Another measure is to select a good subcarrier grouping method. A grouping method is proposed that all groups have the same subcarrier spacing. By the derived rule of evaluating subcarrier grouping, the optimal subcarrier spacing is obtained by computer search under different channels. Simulation results are presented to illustrate the performance of block diagonal DSTF codes and the proposed subcarrier grouping method.

Learning-Based Relay Selection for Cooperative Networks with Space–Time Network Coding

Wireless Personal Communications - Space–time network coding has recently been used in cooperative communication to mitigate the problem of transmission delay in wireless systems as well as...     

A Decorrelating-MRC Based Space–Time Multiuser Receiver for Time-Hopping UWB System

In this paper, we propose a two-stage linear multiuser detector (LMD) for ultra wideband (UWB) multiple single-input multi-output (M-SIMO) system and multipath fading environment. Time-hopping (TH) and antipodal pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) are employed for the multiple access system. The decorrelating detector is first employed at the front end of each receive antenna to eliminate the multi-user interference (MUI), then a set of maximum-ratio-combiners (MRC) are proceeded to maximize the signal-to-noise power ratio (SNR) for each user. Since the channel information is crucial for the Decorrelating-MRC (D-MRC) receiver, we develop a subspace-based blind M-SIMO channel estimation method. The effect of channel estimation error on system performance is extensively evaluated. It is also verified from the analytical and numerical results that by exploiting both spatial and temporal diversities, the D-MRC receiver dramatically improves system performance even without additional coding. Moreover, we demonstrate that both the D-MRC receiver and subspace-based blind channel estimator are computationally feasible and near-far resistant.

Performance of Reduced State S–T Trellis Coded MC-CDMA Systems

In this paper, performance of reduced state space-time trellis coded multi carrier code division multiple access (STTC-MC-CDMA) system is evaluated and compared with the performance of original state STTC-MC-CDMA system. The optimum decoding scheme, i.e., maximum likelihood sequence estimation is employed which uses Viterbi algorithm for decoding STTC code. To simplify the implementation of the STTC decoder, the number of states is reduced by reducing the constraint length of the STTC encoder using generating function technique. In this technique, the generator matrix of STTC code is minimized to reduce the number of states of S–T trellis decoder. It is observed that the performance loss in terms of frame error rate of the reduced state STTC-MC-CDMA system is negligible compared to the original state STTC-MC-CDMA system. It is also noted that by using the reduced state technique the STTC decoder can be made faster since it is having lower computational complexity.     

A Novel Complex Orthogonal Design for Space–Time Coding in Sensor Networks

In this paper, we propose a complex orthogonal design based on the theory of Finite projective plane. As most of the orthogonal designs incur low ratio of time diversity, the proposed complex orthogonal design has a relatively high ratio of time diversity. In addition, the proposed scheme has the following characteristics: (1) full spatial diversity (2) low rate (3) linear processing. We compare the proposed scheme with another complex design to show the tradeoffs. The proposed scheme can be of use for certain applications such as sensor networks and deep space exploration where there might be an imposed limit on the peak transmit power.     

Cooperative Space–Time Coding with Amplify-and- Forward Relaying

Cooperative diversity using distributed space-time codes has been recently proposed to form virtual antennas in order to achieve diversity gain. In this paper, we consider a multi-relay network operating in amplify-and-forward (AAF) mode. Motivated by protocol III presented in (Nabar et al. 2004), we propose a cooperative diversity protocol implementing space–time coding for an arbitrary number of relay nodes when the source-destination link contributes in the second phase. We consider the use of real-orthogonal and quasi-orthogonal designs of space–time codes as they give better performance than random linear-dispersion codes. The pairwise error probability (PEP) has been derived and the theoretical analysis demonstrates that the proposed protocol achieves a diversity of order N + 1, where N is the number of relay nodes. No instantaneous channel state information is required at the relay nodes. The optimum power allocation that minimizes the PEP is obtained with numerical and theoretical analysis. The aggregate system power constraint is considered in the optimization. Simulation results demonstrate an improvement over the existing orthogonal protocols for different source-destination channel conditions. The results also show that the proposed scheme is robust to the channel estimation errors