Cyclic LTI systems in digital signal processing

Cyclic signal processing refers to situations where all the time indices are interpreted modulo some integer L. In such cases, the frequency domain is defined as a uniform discrete grid (as in L-point DFT). This offers more freedom in theoretical as well as design aspects. While circular convolution has been the centerpiece of many algorithms in signal processing for decades, such freedom, especially from the viewpoint of linear system theory, has not been studied in the past. In this paper, we introduce the fundamentals of cyclic multirate systems and filter banks, presenting several important differences between the cyclic and noncyclic cases. Cyclic systems with allpass and paraunitary properties are studied. The paraunitary interpolation problem is introduced, and it is shown that the interpolation does not always succeed. State-space descriptions of cyclic LTI systems are introduced, and the notions of reachability and observability of state equations are revisited. It is shown that unlike in traditional linear systems, these two notions are not related to the system minimality in a simple way. Throughout the paper, a number of open problems are pointed out from the perspective of the signal processor as well as the system theorist

Design of FIR paraunitary filter banks for subband coding using a polynomial eigenvalue decomposition

The problem of paraunitary filter bank design for subband coding has received considerable attention in recent years, not least because of the energy preserving property of this class of filter banks. In this paper, we consider the design of signal-adapted, finite impulse response (FIR), paraunitary filter banks using polynomial matrix EVD (PEVD) techniques. Modifications are proposed to an iterative, time-domain PEVD method, known as the sequential best rotation (SBR2) algorithm, which enables its effective application to the problem of FIR orthonormal filter bank design for efficient subband coding. By choosing an optimisation scheme that maximises the coding gain at each stage of the algorithm, it is shown that the resulting filter bank behaves more and more like the infiniteorder principle component filter bank (PCFB). The proposed method is compared to state-of-the-art techniques, namely the iterative greedy algorithm (IGA), the approximate EVD (AEVD), standard SBR2 and a fast algorithm for FIR compaction filter design, called the window method (WM). We demonstrate that for the calculation of the subband coder, the WM approach offers a low-cost alternative at lower coding gains, while at moderate to high complexity, the proposed approach outperforms the benchmarkers. In terms of run-time complexity, AEVD performs well at low orders, while the proposed algorithm offers a better coding gain than the benchmarkers at moderate to high filter order for a number of simulation scenarios

Complexity and search space reduction in cyclic-by-row PEVD algorithms

In recent years, several algorithms for the iterative calculation of a polynomial matrix eigenvalue decomposition (PEVD) have been introduced. The PEVD is a generalisation of the ordinary EVD and uses paraunitary operations to diagonalise a parahermitian matrix. This paper addresses potential computational savings that can be applied to existing cyclic-by-row approaches for the PEVD. These savings are found during the search and rotation stages, and do not significantly impact on algorithm accuracy. We demonstrate that with the proposed techniques, computations can be significantly reduced. The benefits of this are important for a number of broadband multichannel problems

An algorithm for calculating the QR and singular value decompositions of polynomial matrices

In this paper, a new algorithm for calculating the QR decomposition (QRD) of a polynomial matrix is introduced. This algorithm amounts to transforming a polynomial matrix to upper triangular form by application of a series of paraunitary matrices such as elementary delay and rotation matrices. It is shown that this algorithm can also be used to formulate the singular value decomposition (SVD) of a polynomial matrix, which essentially amounts to diagonalizing a polynomial matrix again by application of a series of paraunitary matrices. Example matrices are used to demonstrate both types of decomposition. Mathematical proofs of convergence of both decompositions are also outlined. Finally, a possible application of such decompositions in multichannel signal processing is discussed

Polynomial matrix decomposition techniques for frequency selective MIMO channels

For a narrowband, instantaneous mixing multi-input, multi-output (MIMO) communications system, the channel is represented as a scalar matrix. In this scenario, singular value decomposition (SVD) provides a number of independent spatial subchannels which can be used to enhance data rates or to increase diversity. Alternatively, a QR decomposition can be used to reduce the MIMO channel equalization problem to a set of single channel equalization problems. In the case of a frequency selective MIMO system, the multipath channel is represented as a polynomial matrix. Thus conventional matrix decomposition techniques can no longer be applied. The traditional solution to this broadband problem is to reduce it to narrowband form by using a discrete Fourier transform (DFT) to split the broadband channel into N narrow uniformly spaced frequency bands and applying scalar decomposition techniques within each band. This describes an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) based system. However, a novel algorithm has been developed for calculating the eigenvalue decomposition of a para-Hermitian polynomial matrix, known as the sequential best rotation (SBR2) algorithm. SBR2 and its QR based derivatives allow a true polynomial singular value and QR decomposition to be formulated. The application of these algorithms within frequency selective MIMO systems results in a fundamentally new approach to exploiting spatial diversity. Polynomial matrix decomposition and OFDM based solutions are compared for a wide variety of broadband MIMO communication systems. SVD is used to create a robust, high gain communications channel for ultra low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) environments. Due to the frequency selective nature of the channels produced by polynomial matrix decomposition, additional processing is required at the receiver resulting in two distinct equalization techniques based around turbo and Viterbi equalization. The proposed approach is found to provide identical performance to that of an existing OFDM scheme while supporting a wider range of access schemes. This work is then extended to QR decomposition based communications systems, where the proposed polynomial approach is found to not only provide superior bit-error-rate (BER) performance but significantly reduce the complexity of transmitter design. Finally both techniques are combined to create a nulti-user MIMO system that provides superior BER performance over an OFDM based scheme. Throughout the work the robustness of the proposed scheme to channel state information (CSI) error is considered, resulting in a rigorous demonstration of the capabilities of the polynomial approach

Efficient implementation of iterative polynomial matrix EVD algorithms exploiting structural redundancy and parallelisation

A number of algorithms are capable of iteratively calculating a polynomial matrix eigenvalue decomposition (PEVD), which is a generalisation of the EVD and will diagonalise a parahermitian polynomial matrix via paraunitary operations. While offering promising results in various broadband array processing applications, the PEVD has seen limited deployment in hardware due to the high computational complexity of these algorithms. Akin to low complexity divide-and-conquer (DaC) solutions to eigenproblems, this paper addresses a partially parallelisable DaC approach to the PEVD. A novel algorithm titled parallel-sequential matrix diagonalisation exhibits significantly reduced algorithmic complexity and run-time when compared with existing iterative PEVD methods. The DaC approach, which is shown to be suitable for multi-core implementation, can improve eigenvalue resolution at the expense of decomposition mean squared error, and offers a trade-off between the approximation order and accuracy of the resulting paraunitary matrices

Broadband adaptive beamforming with low complexity and frequency invariant response

This thesis proposes different methods to reduce the computational complexity as well as increasing the adaptation rate of adaptive broadband beamformers. This is performed exemplarily for the generalised sidelobe canceller (GSC) structure. The GSC is an alternative implementation of the linearly constrained minimum variance beamformer, which can utilise well-known adaptive filtering algorithms, such as the least mean square (LMS) or the recursive least squares (RLS) to perform unconstrained adaptive optimisation.A direct DFT implementation, by which broadband signals are decomposed into frequency bins and processed by independent narrowband beamforming algorithms, is thought to be computationally optimum. However, this setup fail to converge to the time domain minimum mean square error (MMSE) if signal components are not aligned to frequency bins, resulting in a large worst case error. To mitigate this problem of the so-called independent frequency bin (IFB) processor, overlap-save based GSC beamforming structures have been explored. This system address the minimisation of the time domain MMSE, with a significant reduction in computational complexity when compared to time-domain implementations, and show a better convergence behaviour than the IFB beamformer. By studying the effects that the blocking matrix has on the adaptive process for the overlap-save beamformer, several modifications are carried out to enhance both the simplicity of the algorithm as well as its convergence speed. These modifications result in the GSC beamformer utilising a significantly lower computational complexity compare to the time domain approach while offering similar convergence characteristics.In certain applications, especially in the areas of acoustics, there is a need to maintain constant resolution across a wide operating spectrum that may extend across several octaves. To attain constant beamwidth is difficult, particularly if uniformly spaced linear sensor array are employed for beamforming, since spatial resolution is reciprocally proportional to both the array aperture and the frequency. A scaled aperture arrangement is introduced for the subband based GSC beamformer to achieve near uniform resolution across a wide spectrum, whereby an octave-invariant design is achieved. This structure can also be operated in conjunction with adaptive beamforming algorithms. Frequency dependent tapering of the sensor signals is proposed in combination with the overlap-save GSC structure in order to achieve an overall frequency-invariant characteristic. An adaptive version is proposed for frequency-invariant overlap-save GSC beamformer. Broadband adaptive beamforming algorithms based on the family of least mean squares (LMS) algorithms are known to exhibit slow convergence if the input signal is correlated. To improve the convergence of the GSC when based on LMS-type algorithms, we propose the use of a broadband eigenvalue decomposition (BEVD) to decorrelate the input of the adaptive algorithm in the spatial dimension, for which an increase in convergence speed can be demonstrated over other decorrelating measures, such as the Karhunen-Loeve transform. In order to address the remaining temporal correlation after BEVD processing, this approach is combined with subband decomposition through the use of oversampled filter banks. The resulting spatially and temporally decorrelated GSC beamformer provides further enhanced convergence speed over spatial or temporal decorrelation methods on their own

Generalised polynomial power method

The polynomial power method repeatedly multiplies a polynomial vector by a para-Hermitian matrix containing spectrally majorised eigenvalue to estimate the dominant eigenvector corresponding the dominant eigenvalue. To limit the order of the resulting vector, truncation is performed in each iteration. This paper extends the polynomial power method from para-Hermitian matrices to a general polynomial matrix for determining its dominant left- and right-singular vectors and the corresponding singular value. The proposed extension assumes that the dominant singular is positive on the unit circle. The resulting algorithm is compared with a state-of-the-art PSVD algorithm and provides better accuracy with reduced computation time and lower approximation orders for the decomposition

MVDR broadband beamforming using polynomial matrix techniques

This thesis addresses the formulation of and solution to broadband minimum variance distortionless response (MVDR) beamforming. Two approaches to this problem are considered, namely, generalised sidelobe canceller (GSC) and Capon beamformers. These are examined based on a novel technique which relies on polynomial matrix formulations. The new scheme is based on the second order statistics of the array sensor measurements in order to estimate a space-time covariance matrix. The beamforming problem can be formulated based on this space-time covariance matrix. Akin to the narrowband problem, where an optimum solution can be derived from the eigenvalue decomposition (EVD) of a constant covariance matrix, this utility is here extended to the broadband case. The decoupling of the space-time covariance matrix in this case is provided by means of a polynomial matrix EVD. The proposed approach is initially exploited to design a GSC beamformer for a uniform linear array, and then extended to the constrained MVDR, or Capon, beamformer and also the GSC with an arbitrary array structure. The uniqueness of the designed GSC comes from utilising the polynomial matrix technique, and its ability to steer the array beam towards an off-broadside direction without the pre-steering stage that is associated with conventional approaches to broadband beamformers. To solve the broadband beamforming problem, this thesis addresses a number of additional tools. A first one is the accurate construction of both the steering vectors based on fractional delay filters, which are required for the broadband constraint formulation of a beamformer, as for the construction of the quiescent beamformer. In the GSC case, we also discuss how a block matrix can be obtained, and introduce a novel paraunitary matrix completion algorithm. For the Capon beamformer, the polynomial extension requires the inversion of a polynomial matrix, for which a residue-based method is proposed that offers better accuracy compared to previously utilised approaches. These proposed polynomial matrix techniques are evaluated in a number of simulations. The results show that the polynomial broadband beamformer (PBBF) steersthe main beam towards the direction of the signal of interest (SoI) and protects the signal over the specified bandwidth, and at the same time suppresses unwanted signals by placing nulls in their directions. In addition to that, the PBBF is compared to the standard time domain broadband beamformer in terms of their mean square error performance, beam-pattern, and computation complexity. This comparison shows that the PBBF can offer a significant reduction in computation complexity compared to its standard counterpart. Overall, the main benefits of this approach include beam steering towards an arbitrary look direction with no need for pre-steering step, and a potentially significant reduction in computational complexity due to the decoupling of dependencies of the quiescent beamformer, blocking matrix, and the adaptive filter compared to a standard broadband beamformer implementation.This thesis addresses the formulation of and solution to broadband minimum variance distortionless response (MVDR) beamforming. Two approaches to this problem are considered, namely, generalised sidelobe canceller (GSC) and Capon beamformers. These are examined based on a novel technique which relies on polynomial matrix formulations. The new scheme is based on the second order statistics of the array sensor measurements in order to estimate a space-time covariance matrix. The beamforming problem can be formulated based on this space-time covariance matrix. Akin to the narrowband problem, where an optimum solution can be derived from the eigenvalue decomposition (EVD) of a constant covariance matrix, this utility is here extended to the broadband case. The decoupling of the space-time covariance matrix in this case is provided by means of a polynomial matrix EVD. The proposed approach is initially exploited to design a GSC beamformer for a uniform linear array, and then extended to the constrained MVDR, or Capon, beamformer and also the GSC with an arbitrary array structure. The uniqueness of the designed GSC comes from utilising the polynomial matrix technique, and its ability to steer the array beam towards an off-broadside direction without the pre-steering stage that is associated with conventional approaches to broadband beamformers. To solve the broadband beamforming problem, this thesis addresses a number of additional tools. A first one is the accurate construction of both the steering vectors based on fractional delay filters, which are required for the broadband constraint formulation of a beamformer, as for the construction of the quiescent beamformer. In the GSC case, we also discuss how a block matrix can be obtained, and introduce a novel paraunitary matrix completion algorithm. For the Capon beamformer, the polynomial extension requires the inversion of a polynomial matrix, for which a residue-based method is proposed that offers better accuracy compared to previously utilised approaches. These proposed polynomial matrix techniques are evaluated in a number of simulations. The results show that the polynomial broadband beamformer (PBBF) steersthe main beam towards the direction of the signal of interest (SoI) and protects the signal over the specified bandwidth, and at the same time suppresses unwanted signals by placing nulls in their directions. In addition to that, the PBBF is compared to the standard time domain broadband beamformer in terms of their mean square error performance, beam-pattern, and computation complexity. This comparison shows that the PBBF can offer a significant reduction in computation complexity compared to its standard counterpart. Overall, the main benefits of this approach include beam steering towards an arbitrary look direction with no need for pre-steering step, and a potentially significant reduction in computational complexity due to the decoupling of dependencies of the quiescent beamformer, blocking matrix, and the adaptive filter compared to a standard broadband beamformer implementation