Multiuser Scheduler and FDE Design for SC-FDMA MIMO Systems

This paper presents a novel spatial frequency domain packet scheduling and frequency domain equalization (FDE) algorithm for uplink Single Carrier (SC) Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) multiuser MIMO systems. Our analysis model is confined to 3GPP uplink SC-FDMA transmission with Multi-user (MU) Spatial Division Multiplexing (SDM). The results show that the proposed MU-MIMO scheduler in conjunction with the new FDE singificantly increases the maximum achievable rate and improves the bit error rate (BER) performance for the system under consideration

Channel estimation in massive MIMO systems

Last years were characterized by a great demand for high data throughput, good quality and spectral efficiency in wireless communication systems. Consequently, a revolution in cellular networks has been set in motion towards to 5G. Massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) is one of the new concepts in 5G and the idea is to scale up the known MIMO systems in unprecedented proportions, by deploying hundreds of antennas at base stations. Although, perfect channel knowledge is crucial in these systems for user and data stream separation in order to cancel interference. The most common way to estimate the channel is based on pilots. However, problems such as interference and pilot contamination (PC) can arise due to the multiplicity of channels in the wireless link. Therefore, it is crucial to define techniques for channel estimation that together with pilot contamination mitigation allow best system performance and at same time low complexity. This work introduces a low-complexity channel estimation technique based on Zadoff-Chu training sequences. In addition, different approaches were studied towards pilot contamination mitigation and low complexity schemes, with resort to iterative channel estimation methods, semi-blind subspace tracking techniques and matrix inversion substitutes. System performance simulations were performed for the several proposed techniques in order to identify the best tradeoff between complexity, spectral efficiency and system performance

Técnicas de processamento com múltiplas antenas para o sistema LTE

Mestrado em Engenharia Electrónica e TelecomunicaçõesPerformance, mobilidade e partilha podem ser consideras como as três palavras-chave nas comunicações móveis de hoje em dia. Uma das necessidades fundamentais do ser humano é a partilha de experiencias e informação. Com a evolução ao nível do hardware móvel, a crescente popularidade de smartphones, tablets e outros dispositivos moveis, fez com que a exigência em termos de capacidade e taxa de transferência por parte das redes móveis não parasse de crescer. As limitações das redes 3G fizeram com que não conseguissem corresponder a tais exigências e como tal, a transição para uma tecnologia mais robusta e eficiente passou a ser inevitável. A resposta escolhida como solução a longo prazo é a rede designada por LTE, desenvolvida pela organização 3GPP é assumido que será a rede de telecomunicações predominante no futuro. As vantagens mais sonantes são, naturalmente, elevadas taxas de transmissão, maior eficiência espectral, redução da latência e de custos de operação. As principais tecnologias em que o LTE se baseia, são o OFDM e sua variante para múltiplo acesso, OFDMA, usado para o downlink e o SC-FDMA para o uplink. Além disso, usa sistemas com múltiplas antenas para impulsionar a eficiência espectral. Apesar de já implementado em alguns países por diversas operadoras, constantes pesquisas continuam a ser realizadas com o intuito de melhorar a sua performance. Nesta dissertação é proposto um esquema duplo de codificação na frequência e no espaço (D-SFBC) para um cenário baseado em OFDM com 4 antenas de transmissão e duas antenas de recepção (4 × 2 D-SFBC) para o downlink. No cenário considerado, 4 símbolos de dados são transmitidos utilizando unicamente 2 sub-portadoras, fazendo com que, este sistema seja limitado pela interferência. Para de forma eficiente descodificar os símbolos de dados transmitidos, foi desenvolvido um equalizador iterativo no domínio da frequência. Duas abordagens são consideradas: cancelamento da interferência em paralelo (PIC) e sucessivo cancelamento de interferência (SIC). Uma vez que apenas 2 sub-portadoras são usadas para transmitir quatro símbolos de dados em paralelo, o esquema desenvolvido duplica a taxa de dados quando comparado com o esquema 2 × 2 SFBC, especificado no standard do LTE. Os esquemas desenvolvidos foram avaliados sob as especificações para LTE e usando codificação de canal. Os resultados mostram que os esquemas implementados neste trabalho utilizando um equalizador iterativo supera os convencionais equalizadores lineares na eliminação da interferência adicional introduzida, em apenas 2 ou 3 iterações.Performance, mobility and sharing can be assumed as the three keywords in the mobile communications nowadays. One of the fundamental needs of human beings is to share experiences and information. With the evolution of mobile hardware level, the growing popularity of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices, has made that the demand in terms of capacity and throughput by mobile networks did not stop growing. Thus, the limitations of 3G stops it of being the answer of such demand, and a transition to a powerful technology has become unavoidable. The answer chosen is LTE, developed by the 3GPP organization is assumed to be the predominant telecommunications network in the future. The most relevant advantages are high transmission rates, higher spectral efficiency, reducing latency and operating costs. The key technologies in which LTE is based, are OFDM and its variant schemes for multiple access, OFDMA, used for downlink, and SC-FDMA for the uplink. It also uses multiple antennas systems in order to improve spectral efficiency. Although already implemented in some countries by several operators, continuous research is conducted in order to improve their performance. In this dissertation it is proposed a double space-frequency block coding (D-SFBC) scheme for an OFDM based scenario with 4 transmit antennas and 2 receive antennas (4×2 D-SFBC) for the downlink. In the considered scenario, 4 data symbols are transmitted by using only 2 subcarriers and thus the system is interference limited. To efficiently decode the transmitted data symbols an iterative equalizer designed in frequency domain is developed. Two approaches are considered: parallel interference cancellation (PIC) and successive interference cancellation (SIC). Since only 2 subcarriers are used to transmit 4 data symbols in parallel the developed scheme achieve the double data rate when compared with the 2×2 SFBC, specified in the LTE standard. The developed schemes were evaluated under the main LTE specifications and using channel coding. The results have show that the schemes implemented in this work using an interactive equalizer outperforms the conventional linear equalizers in the interference removal, just by using 2 or 3 iterations

Técnicas de equalização iterativas no espaço-frequência para o LTE

Mestrado em Engenharia Electrónica e TelecomunicaçõesMobile communications had a huge leap on its evolution in the last decade due to the constant increase of the user requirements. The Long Term Evolution is the new technology developed to give proper answer to the needs of a growing mobile communications community, offering much higher data rates, better spectral efficiency and lower latency when compared to previous technologies, along with scalable bandwidth, interoperability and easy roaming. All these advantages are possible due to the implementation of new network architectures like the E-UTRAN access network and the EPC core network, the use of MIMO systems, and new multiple access schemes: OFDMA for downlink and SC-FDMA for uplink. This thesis focuses on the uplink communication of this technology with SC-FDMA, specifically on the use of Iterative Block Decision Feedback Equalizers (IB-DFE) where both the feedback and the feedforward equalizer matrices are applied on the frequency domain. Two IB-DFE schemes were implemented using both Parallel Interference Cancellation (PIC) and Serial Interference Cancellation (SIC) based processing. We considered the uplink scenario where some users share the same physical channel to transmit its own information to the Base Station (BS). Also, we consider that the BS is equipped with multiple antennas and the user terminals (UT) with a single antenna. The aim of the studied iterative schemes is to efficiently remove both the multi-user and inter-carrier interferences, while allowing a close-to-optimum space-diversity gain. The results obtained showed that both PIC and SIC implementations presented better performance than the conventional used linear multi-user sub optimal equalizers ZF and MMSE. Both solutions efficiently eliminate the multi-user interference, although the SIC based scheme slightly outperforms the PIC approach, with a performance close to the one achieved by the Matched Filter Bound (MFB).As comunicações móveis tiveram um grande avanço na sua evolução na última década devido ao constante aumento dos requisitos dos utilizadores. O Long Term Evolution é a nova tecnologia desenvolvida para dar resposta às necessidades de uma crescente comunidade de comunicações móveis, oferecendo taxas de transmissão de dados muito mais elevadas, melhor eficiência espectral e menor latência quando comparado a tecnologias anteriores, incluindo também largura de banda escalável, interoperabilidade e roaming simples. Todas estas vantagens são possíveis devido à implementação de novas arquiteturas de rede, como a rede de acesso E-UTRAN e a rede core EPC, o uso de sistemas MIMO, e novos esquemas de múltiplo acesso: OFDMA para o downlink e SC-FDMA para o uplink. Esta tese centra-se na comunicação no sentido ascendente desta tecnologia onde o esquema utilizado é o SC-FDMA, mais especificamente na aplicação de Iterative Block Decision Feedback Equalizers (IB-DFE) onde tanto a matriz de feedback como a de feedfoward do equalizador são aplicadas no domínio da frequência. Dois esquemas IB-DFE foram implementados utilizando processamento baseado em cancelamento de interferência em paralelo (PIC) e em serie (SIC). Foi considerado um cenário ascendente onde alguns utilizadores (UEs) partilham o mesmo canal físico para transmitir a sua informação para a Estação Base (BS). È também assumido que a BS está equipada com múltiplas antenas, e os terminais dos utilizadores com uma antena apenas. O objetivo dos esquemas iterativos estudados é remover eficientemente a interferência entre utilizadores e entre portadoras, permitindo entretanto um ganho de diversidade no espaço quase ótimo. Os resultados obtidos mostraram que tanto a implementação PIC como a SIC apresentam melhor eficiência do que os habituais equalizadores lineares sub ótimos ZF e MMSE. Ambas as soluções eliminam a interferência entre utilizadores, embora o esquema SIC apresente um melhor desempenho que o PIC, aproximando- se do atingido com o Matched Filter Bound (MFB)

Performance Evaluation of LTE and LTE advanced standards for next generation mobile networks

Nel corso della trattazione sono analizzati gli standard 3GPP LTE e LTE-Advanced per la prossima generazione delle reti mobili cellulari. L'algoritmo OptiMOS, che può essere impiegato dalla Stazione Base per servire in modo efficiente connessioni VoIP, è descritto nel capitolo [8]. L’algoritmo di link scheduling Relay, finalizzato a ottimizzare le reti LTE avanzate in presenza di nodi relay è descritto nel capitolo [9]. Questo lavoro è stato presentato in adempimento parziale dei requisiti per la Laurea di Dottore di Ricerca in Ingegneria dell'Informazione presso l'ufficio informazioni Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Università degli Studi di Pisa, Italia

Técnicas de equalização e pré-codificação para sistemas MC-CDMA

Mestrado em Engenharia Eletrónica e TelecomunicaçõesO número de dispositivos com ligações e aplicações sem fios está a aumentar exponencialmente, causando problemas de interferência e diminuindo a capacidade do sistema. Isto desencadeou uma procura por uma eficiência espectral superior e, consequentemente, tornou-se necessário desenvolver novas arquitecturas celulares que suportem estas novas exigências. Coordenação ou cooperação multicelular é uma arquitectura promissora para sistemas celulares sem fios. Esta ajuda a mitigar a interferência entre células, melhorando a equidade e a capacidade do sistema. É, portanto, uma arquitectura já em estudo ao abrigo da tecnologia LTE-Advanced sob o conceito de coordenação multiponto (CoMP). Nesta dissertação, considerámos um sistema coordenado MC-CDMA com pré-codificação e equalização iterativas. Uma das técnicas mais eficientes de pré-codificação é o alinhamento de interferências (IA). Este é um conceito relativamente novo que permite aumentar a capacidade do sistema em canais de elevada interferência. Sabe-se que, para os sistemas MC-CDMA, os equalizadores lineares convencionais não são os mais eficientes, devido à interferência residual entre portadoras (ICI). No entanto, a equalização iterativa no domínio da frequência (FDE) foi identificada como sendo uma das técnicas mais eficientes para lidar com ICI e explorar a diversidade oferecida pelos sistemas MIMO MC-CDMA. Esta técnica é baseada no conceito Iterative Block Decision Feedback Equalization (IB-DFE). Nesta dissertação, é proposto um sistema MC-CDMA que une a pré-codificação iterativa do alinhamento de interferências no transmissor ao equalizador baseado no IB-DFE, com cancelamento sucessivo de interferências (SIC) no receptor. Este é construído por dois blocos: um filtro linear, que mitiga a interferência inter-utilizador, seguido por um bloco iterativo no domínio da frequência, que separa eficientemente os fluxos de dados espaciais na presença de interferência residual inter-utilizador alinhada. Este esquema permite atingir o número máximo de graus de liberdade e permite simultaneamente um ganho óptimo de diversidade espacial. O desempenho deste esquema está perto do filtro adaptado- Matched Filter Bound (MFB).The number of devices with wireless connections and applications is increasing exponentially, causing interference problems and reducing the system’s capacity gain. This initiated a search for a higher spectral efficiency and therefore it became necessary to develop new cellular architectures that support these new requirements. Multicell cooperation or coordination is a promising architecture for cellular wireless systems to mitigate intercell interference, improving system fairness and increasing capacity, and thus is already under study in LTE-Advanced under the coordinated multipoint (CoMP) concept. In this thesis, efficient iterative precoding and equalization is considered for coordinated MC-CDMA based systems. One of the most efficient precoding techniques is interference alignment (IA), which is a relatively new concept that allows high capacity gains in interfering channels. It is well known that for MC-CDMA systems standard linear equalizers are not the most efficient due to residual inter carrier interference (ICI). However, iterative frequency-domain equalization (FDE) has been identified as one of the most efficient technique to deal with ICI and exploit the inherent space-frequency diversity of the MIMO MC-CDMA systems, namely the one based on Iterative Block Decision Feedback Equalization (IB-DFE) concept. In this thesis, it is proposed a MC-CDMA system that joins iterative IA precoding at the transmitter with IB-DFE successive interference cancellation (SIC) based receiver structure. The receiver is implemented in two steps: a linear filter, which mitigates the inter-user aligned interference, followed by an iterative frequency-domain receiver, which efficiently separates the spatial streams in the presence of residual inter-user aligned interference. This scheme provides the maximum degrees of freedom (DoF) and allows almost the optimum space-diversity gain. The scheme performance is close to the matched filter bound (MFB)

Mobile and Wireless Communications

Mobile and Wireless Communications have been one of the major revolutions of the late twentieth century. We are witnessing a very fast growth in these technologies where mobile and wireless communications have become so ubiquitous in our society and indispensable for our daily lives. The relentless demand for higher data rates with better quality of services to comply with state-of-the art applications has revolutionized the wireless communication field and led to the emergence of new technologies such as Bluetooth, WiFi, Wimax, Ultra wideband, OFDMA. Moreover, the market tendency confirms that this revolution is not ready to stop in the foreseen future. Mobile and wireless communications applications cover diverse areas including entertainment, industrialist, biomedical, medicine, safety and security, and others, which definitely are improving our daily life. Wireless communication network is a multidisciplinary field addressing different aspects raging from theoretical analysis, system architecture design, and hardware and software implementations. While different new applications are requiring higher data rates and better quality of service and prolonging the mobile battery life, new development and advanced research studies and systems and circuits designs are necessary to keep pace with the market requirements. This book covers the most advanced research and development topics in mobile and wireless communication networks. It is divided into two parts with a total of thirty-four stand-alone chapters covering various areas of wireless communications of special topics including: physical layer and network layer, access methods and scheduling, techniques and technologies, antenna and amplifier design, integrated circuit design, applications and systems. These chapters present advanced novel and cutting-edge results and development related to wireless communication offering the readers the opportunity to enrich their knowledge in specific topics as well as to explore the whole field of rapidly emerging mobile and wireless networks. We hope that this book will be useful for students, researchers and practitioners in their research studies

Convergence of packet communications over the evolved mobile networks; signal processing and protocol performance

In this thesis, the convergence of packet communications over the evolved mobile networks is studied. The Long Term Evolution (LTE) process is dominating the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) in order to bring technologies to the markets in the spirit of continuous innovation. The global markets of mobile information services are growing towards the Mobile Information Society. The thesis begins with the principles and theories of the multiple-access transmission schemes, transmitter receiver techniques and signal processing algorithms. Next, packet communications and Internet protocols are referred from the IETF standards with the characteristics of mobile communications in the focus. The mobile network architecture and protocols bind together the evolved packet system of Internet communications to the radio access network technologies. Specifics of the traffic models are shortly visited for their statistical meaning in the radio performance analysis. Radio resource management algorithms and protocols, also procedures, are covered addressing their relevance for the system performance. Throughout these Chapters, the commonalities and differentiators of the WCDMA, WCDMA/HSPA and LTE are covered. The main outcome of the thesis is the performance analysis of the LTE technology beginning from the early discoveries to the analysis of various system features and finally converging to an extensive system analysis campaign. The system performance is analysed with the characteristics of voice over the Internet and best effort traffic of the Internet. These traffic classes represent the majority of the mobile traffic in the converged packet networks, and yet they are simple enough for a fair and generic analysis of technologies. The thesis consists of publications and inventions created by the author that proposed several improvements to the 3G technologies towards the LTE. In the system analysis, the LTE showed by the factor of at least 2.5 to 3 times higher system measures compared to the WCDMA/HSPA reference. The WCDMA/HSPA networks are currently available with over 400 million subscribers and showing increasing growth, in the meanwhile the first LTE roll-outs are scheduled to begin in 2010. Sophisticated 3G LTE mobile devices are expected to appear fluently for all consumer segments in the following years