On an Achievable Rate of Large Rayleigh Block-Fading MIMO Channels with No CSI

Training-based transmission over Rayleigh block-fading multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels is investigated. As a training method a combination of a pilot-assisted scheme and a biased signaling scheme is considered. The achievable rates of successive decoding (SD) receivers based on the linear minimum mean-squared error (LMMSE) channel estimation are analyzed in the large-system limit, by using the replica method under the assumption of replica symmetry. It is shown that negligible pilot information is best in terms of the achievable rates of the SD receivers in the large-system limit. The obtained analytical formulas of the achievable rates can improve the existing lower bound on the capacity of the MIMO channel with no channel state information (CSI), derived by Hassibi and Hochwald, for all signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs). The comparison between the obtained bound and a high SNR approximation of the channel capacity, derived by Zheng and Tse, implies that the high SNR approximation is unreliable unless quite high SNR is considered. Energy efficiency in the low SNR regime is also investigated in terms of the power per information bit required for reliable communication. The required minimum power is shown to be achieved at a positive rate for the SD receiver with no CSI, whereas it is achieved in the zero-rate limit for the case of perfect CSI available at the receiver. Moreover, numerical simulations imply that the presented large-system analysis can provide a good approximation for not so large systems. The results in this paper imply that SD schemes can provide a significant performance gain in the low-to-moderate SNR regimes, compared to conventional receivers based on one-shot channel estimation.Comment: re-submitted to IEEE Trans. Inf. Theor

One-Bit Massive MIMO: Channel Estimation and High-Order Modulations

We investigate the information-theoretic throughout achievable on a fading communication link when the receiver is equipped with one-bit analog-to-digital converters (ADCs). The analysis is conducted for the setting where neither the transmitter nor the receiver have a priori information on the realization of the fading channels. This means that channel-state information needs to be acquired at the receiver on the basis of the one-bit quantized channel outputs. We show that least-squares (LS) channel estimation combined with joint pilot and data processing is capacity achieving in the single-user, single-receive-antenna case. We also investigate the achievable uplink throughput in a massive multiple-input multiple-output system where each element of the antenna array at the receiver base-station feeds a one-bit ADC. We show that LS channel estimation and maximum-ratio combining are sufficient to support both multiuser operation and the use of high-order constellations. This holds in spite of the severe nonlinearity introduced by the one-bit ADCs