Energy Efficient VLSI Circuits for MIMO-WLAN

Mobile communication - anytime, anywhere access to data and communication services - has been continuously increasing since the operation of the first wireless communication link by Guglielmo Marconi. The demand for higher data rates, despite the limited bandwidth, led to the development of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communication which is often combined with orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM). Together, these two techniques achieve a high bandwidth efficiency. Unfortunately, techniques such as MIMO-OFDM significantly increase the signal processing complexity of transceivers. While fast improvements in the integrated circuit (IC) technology enabled to implement more signal processing complexity per chip, large efforts had and have to be done for novel algorithms as well as for efficient very large scaled integration (VLSI) architectures in order to meet today's and tomorrow's requirements for mobile wireless communication systems. In this thesis, we will present architectures and VLSI implementations of complete physical (PHY) layer application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) under the constraints imposed by an industrial wireless communication standard. Contrary to many other publications, we do not elaborate individual components of a MIMO-OFDM communication system stand-alone, but in the context of the complete PHY layer ASIC. We will investigate the performance of several MIMO detectors and the corresponding preprocessing circuits, being integrated into the entire PHY layer ASIC, in terms of achievable error-rate, power consumption, and area requirement. Finally, we will assemble the results from the proposed PHY layer implementations in order to enhance the energy efficiency of a transceiver. To this end, we propose a cross-layer optimization of PHY layer and medium access control (MAC) layer

Low-Complexity Near-Optimal Detection Algorithms for MIMO Systems

As the number of subscribers in wireless networks and their demanding data rate are exponentially increasing, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems have been scaled up in the 5G where tens to hundreds of antennas are deployed at base stations (BSs). However, by scaling up the MIMO systems, designing detectors with low computational complexity and close to the optimal error performance becomes challenging. In this dissertation, we study the problem of efficient detector designs for MIMO systems. In Chapter 2, we propose efficient detection algorithms for small and moderate MIMO systems by using lattice reduction and subspace (or conditional) detection techniques. The proposed algorithms exhibit full receive diversity and approach the bit error rate (BER) of the optimal maximum likelihood (ML) solution. For quasi-static channels, the complexity of the proposed schemes is cubic in the system dimension and is only linear in the size of the QAM modulation used. However, the computational complexity of lattice reduction algorithms imposes a large burden on the proposed detectors for large MIMO systems or fast fading channels. In Chapter 3, we propose detectors for large MIMO systems based on the combination of minimum mean square error decision feedback equalization (MMSE-DFE) and subspace detection tailored to an appropriate channel ordering. Although the achieved diversity order of the proposed detectors does not necessarily equal the full receive diversity for some MIMO systems, the coding gain allows for close to ML error performance at practical values of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the cost of a small computational complexity increase over the classical MMSE- DFE detection. The receive diversity deficiency is addressed by proposing another algorithm in which a partial lattice reduction (PLR) technique is deployed to improve the diversity order. Massive multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO) is another technology where the BS is equipped with hundreds of antennas and serves tens of single-antenna user terminals (UTs). For the uplink of massive MIMO systems, linear detectors, such as zero-forcing (ZF) and minimum mean square error (MMSE), approach the error performances of sophisticated nonlinear detectors. However, the exact solutions of ZF and MMSE involve matrix-matrix multiplication and matrix inversion operations which are expensive for massive MIMO systems. In Chapter 4, we propose efficient truncated polynomial expansion (TPE)-based detectors that achieve the error performance of the exact solutions with a computational complexity proportional to the system dimensions. The millimeter wave (mmWave) massive MIMO is another key technology for 5G cellular networks. By using hybrid beamforming techniques in which a few numbers of radio frequency (RF) chains are deployed at the BSs and the UTs, the fully-digital precoder (combiner) is approximated as a product of analog and digital precoders (combiners). In Chapter 5, we consider a signal detection scheme using the equivalent channel consisting of the precoder, mmWave channel, and combiner. The available structure in the equivalent channel enables us to achieve the BER of the optimal ML solution with a significant reduction in the computational complexity

Self-concatenated coding for wireless communication systems

In this thesis, we have explored self-concatenated coding schemes that are designed for transmission over Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) and uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. We designed both the symbol-based Self-ConcatenatedCodes considered using Trellis Coded Modulation (SECTCM) and bit-based Self- Concatenated Convolutional Codes (SECCC) using a Recursive Systematic Convolutional (RSC) encoder as constituent codes, respectively. The design of these codes was carried out with the aid of Extrinsic Information Transfer (EXIT) charts. The EXIT chart based design has been found an efficient tool in finding the decoding convergence threshold of the constituent codes. Additionally, in order to recover the information loss imposed by employing binary rather than non-binary schemes, a soft decision demapper was introduced in order to exchange extrinsic information withthe SECCC decoder. To analyse this information exchange 3D-EXIT chart analysis was invoked for visualizing the extrinsic information exchange between the proposed Iteratively Decoding aided SECCC and soft-decision demapper (SECCC-ID). Some of the proposed SECTCM, SECCC and SECCC-ID schemes perform within about 1 dB from the AWGN and Rayleigh fading channels’ capacity. A union bound analysis of SECCC codes was carried out to find the corresponding Bit Error Ratio (BER) floors. The union bound of SECCCs was derived for communications over both AWGN and uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels, based on a novel interleaver concept.Application of SECCCs in both UltraWideBand (UWB) and state-of-the-art video-telephone schemes demonstrated its practical benefits.In order to further exploit the benefits of the low complexity design offered by SECCCs we explored their application in a distributed coding scheme designed for cooperative communications, where iterative detection is employed by exchanging extrinsic information between the decoders of SECCC and RSC at the destination. In the first transmission period of cooperation, the relay receives the potentially erroneous data and attempts to recover the information. The recovered information is then re-encoded at the relay using an RSC encoder. In the second transmission period this information is then retransmitted to the destination. The resultant symbols transmitted from the source and relay nodes can be viewed as the coded symbols of a three-component parallel-concatenated encoder. At the destination a Distributed Binary Self-Concatenated Coding scheme using Iterative Decoding (DSECCC-ID) was employed, where the two decoders (SECCC and RSC) exchange their extrinsic information. It was shown that the DSECCC-ID is a low-complexity scheme, yet capable of approaching the Discrete-input Continuous-output Memoryless Channels’s (DCMC) capacity.Finally, we considered coding schemes designed for two nodes communicating with each other with the aid of a relay node, where the relay receives information from the two nodes in the first transmission period. At the relay node we combine a powerful Superposition Coding (SPC) scheme with SECCC. It is assumed that decoding errors may be encountered at the relay node. The relay node then broadcasts this information in the second transmission period after re-encoding it, again, using a SECCC encoder. At the destination, the amalgamated block of Successive Interference Cancellation (SIC) scheme combined with SECCC then detects and decodes the signal either with or without the aid of a priori information. Our simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme is capable of reliably operating at a low BER for transmission over both AWGN and uncorrelated Rayleigh fading channels. We compare the proposed scheme’s performance to a direct transmission link between the two sources having the same throughput

Improving Bandwidth Utilization in a 1 Tbps Airborne MIMO Communications Downlink

FEC techniques are compared for different MIMO configurations of a high altitude, extremely wide bandwidth radio frequency downlink. Monte Carlo simulations are completed in MATLAB® with the aim of isolating the impacts of turbo codes and LDPC codes on system throughput and error performance. The system is modeled as a transmit-only static array at an altitude of 60,000 feet, with no interferers in the channel. Transmissions are received by a static receiver array. Simulations attempt to determine what modulation types should be considered for practical implementation, and what FEC codes enable these modulation schemes. The antenna configurations used in this study are [44:352], [62:248], and [80:160] transmitters to receivers. Effects from waveform generation, mixing, down-conversion, and amplification are not considered. Criteria of interest were BER and throughput, with the maximum allowable value of the former set at 1 x 10-5, and the latter set at a 1 terabits per second (Tbps) transfer rate for a successful configuration. Results show that the best performing system configuration was unable to meet both criteria, but was capable of improving over Brueggen\u27s 2012 research, which used Reed-Solomon codes and a MIMO configuration of [80:160], by 18.6%. The best-case configuration produced a throughput rate of 0.83 Tbps at a BER of less than 1 x 10-8, by implementing a rate 2/3 LDPC code with QAM constellation of 16 symbols

MIMO communication systems: receiver design and diversity-multiplexing tradeoff analysis

After a few decades\u27 evolution of wireless communication systems, to ensure reliable high-speed communication over unreliable wireless channels is still one of the major challenges facing researchers and engineers. The use of multiple antennas at transmitter and receiver, known as multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communications, is one promising technology delivering desired wireless services. The main goal of this thesis is to study two important issues in wireless MIMO communication systems: receiver design for coded MIMO systems, and diversity-multiplexing tradeoff analysis in general fading channels;In the first part of this thesis, we decompose the receiver design problem into two sub-problems: MIMO channel estimation and MIMO detection. For the MIMO channel estimation, we develop an expectation-maximization (EM) based semi-blind channel and noise covariance matrix estimation algorithm for space-time coding systems under spatially correlated noise. By incorporating the proposed channel estimator into the iterative receiver structure, both the channel estimation and the error-control decoding are improved significantly. We also derive the modified Cramer-Rao bounds (MCRB) for the unknown parameters as the channel estimation performance metric, and demonstrate that the proposed channel estimation algorithm can achieve the MCRB after several iterations. For the MIMO detection, we propose a novel low-complexity MIMO detection algorithm, which has only cubic order computational complexity, but with near-optimal performance. For a 4x4 turbo-coded system, we show that the proposed detector had the same performance as the maximum a posteriori (MAP) detector for BPSK modulation, and 0.1 dB advantage over the approximated MAP detector (list sphere decoding algorithm) for 16-QAM modulation at BER = 10-4;In the second part of this thesis, we derive the optimal diversity-multiplexing tradeoff for general MIMO fading channels, which include different fading types as special cases. We show that for a MIMO system with long coherence time, the optimal diversity-multiplexing tradeoff is also a piecewise linear function, and only the first segment is affected by different fading types. We proved that under certain full-rank assumptions spatial correlation has no effect on the optimal tradeoff. We also argued that non-zero channel means in general are not beneficial for multiplexing-diversity tradeoff