AirSync: Enabling Distributed Multiuser MIMO with Full Spatial Multiplexing

The enormous success of advanced wireless devices is pushing the demand for higher wireless data rates. Denser spectrum reuse through the deployment of more access points per square mile has the potential to successfully meet the increasing demand for more bandwidth. In theory, the best approach to density increase is via distributed multiuser MIMO, where several access points are connected to a central server and operate as a large distributed multi-antenna access point, ensuring that all transmitted signal power serves the purpose of data transmission, rather than creating "interference." In practice, while enterprise networks offer a natural setup in which distributed MIMO might be possible, there are serious implementation difficulties, the primary one being the need to eliminate phase and timing offsets between the jointly coordinated access points. In this paper we propose AirSync, a novel scheme which provides not only time but also phase synchronization, thus enabling distributed MIMO with full spatial multiplexing gains. AirSync locks the phase of all access points using a common reference broadcasted over the air in conjunction with a Kalman filter which closely tracks the phase drift. We have implemented AirSync as a digital circuit in the FPGA of the WARP radio platform. Our experimental testbed, comprised of two access points and two clients, shows that AirSync is able to achieve phase synchronization within a few degrees, and allows the system to nearly achieve the theoretical optimal multiplexing gain. We also discuss MAC and higher layer aspects of a practical deployment. To the best of our knowledge, AirSync offers the first ever realization of the full multiuser MIMO gain, namely the ability to increase the number of wireless clients linearly with the number of jointly coordinated access points, without reducing the per client rate.Comment: Submitted to Transactions on Networkin

Joint Interference Alignment and Bi-Directional Scheduling for MIMO Two-Way Multi-Link Networks

By means of the emerging technique of dynamic Time Division Duplex (TDD), the switching point between uplink and downlink transmissions can be optimized across a multi-cell system in order to reduce the impact of inter-cell interference. It has been recently recognized that optimizing also the order in which uplink and downlink transmissions, or more generally the two directions of a two-way link, are scheduled can lead to significant benefits in terms of interference reduction. In this work, the optimization of bi-directional scheduling is investigated in conjunction with the design of linear precoding and equalization for a general multi-link MIMO two-way system. A simple algorithm is proposed that performs the joint optimization of the ordering of the transmissions in the two directions of the two-way links and of the linear transceivers, with the aim of minimizing the interference leakage power. Numerical results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed strategy.Comment: To be presented at ICC 2015, 6 pages, 7 figure

Joint Source and Relay Precoding Designs for MIMO Two-Way Relaying Based on MSE Criterion

Properly designed precoders can significantly improve the spectral efficiency of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relay systems. In this paper, we investigate joint source and relay precoding design based on the mean-square-error (MSE) criterion in MIMO two-way relay systems, where two multi-antenna source nodes exchange information via a multi-antenna amplify-and-forward relay node. This problem is non-convex and its optimal solution remains unsolved. Aiming to find an efficient way to solve the problem, we first decouple the primal problem into three tractable sub-problems, and then propose an iterative precoding design algorithm based on alternating optimization. The solution to each sub-problem is optimal and unique, thus the convergence of the iterative algorithm is guaranteed. Secondly, we propose a structured precoding design to lower the computational complexity. The proposed precoding structure is able to parallelize the channels in the multiple access (MAC) phase and broadcast (BC) phase. It thus reduces the precoding design to a simple power allocation problem. Lastly, for the special case where only a single data stream is transmitted from each source node, we present a source-antenna-selection (SAS) based precoding design algorithm. This algorithm selects only one antenna for transmission from each source and thus requires lower signalling overhead. Comprehensive simulation is conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of all the proposed precoding designs.Comment: 32 pages, 10 figure

Advances in Multi-User Scheduling and Turbo Equalization for Wireless MIMO Systems

Nach einer Einleitung behandelt Teil 2 Mehrbenutzer-Scheduling für die Abwärtsstrecke von drahtlosen MIMO Systemen mit einer Sendestation und kanaladaptivem precoding: In jeder Zeit- oder Frequenzressource kann eine andere Nutzergruppe gleichzeitig bedient werden, räumlich getrennt durch unterschiedliche Antennengewichte. Nutzer mit korrelierten Kanälen sollten nicht gleichzeitig bedient werden, da dies die räumliche Trennbarkeit erschwert. Die Summenrate einer Nutzermenge hängt von den Antennengewichten ab, die wiederum von der Nutzerauswahl abhängen. Zur Entkopplung des Problems schlägt diese Arbeit Metriken vor basierend auf einer geschätzten Rate mit ZF precoding. Diese lässt sich mit Hilfe von wiederholten orthogonalen Projektionen abschätzen, wodurch die Berechnung von Antennengewichten beim Scheduling entfällt. Die Ratenschätzung kann basierend auf momentanen Kanalmessungen oder auf gemittelter Kanalkenntnis berechnet werden und es können Datenraten- und Fairness-Kriterien berücksichtig werden. Effiziente Suchalgorithmen werden vorgestellt, die die gesamte Systembandbreite auf einmal bearbeiten können und zur Komplexitätsreduktion die Lösung in Zeit- und Frequenz nachführen können. Teil 3 zeigt wie mehrere Sendestationen koordiniertes Scheduling und kooperative Signalverarbeitung einsetzen können. Mittels orthogonalen Projektionen ist es möglich, Inter-Site Interferenz zu schätzen, ohne Antennengewichte berechnen zu müssen. Durch ein Konzept virtueller Nutzer kann der obige Scheduling-Ansatz auf mehrere Sendestationen und sogar Relays mit SDMA erweitert werden. Auf den benötigten Signalisierungsaufwand wird kurz eingegangen und eine Methode zur Schätzung der Summenrate eines Systems ohne Koordination besprochen. Teil4 entwickelt Optimierungen für Turbo Entzerrer. Diese Nutzen Signalkorrelation als Quelle von Redundanz. Trotzdem kann eine Kombination mit MIMO precoding sinnvoll sein, da bei Annahme realistischer Fehler in der Kanalkenntnis am Sender keine optimale Interferenzunterdrückung möglich ist. Mit Hilfe von EXIT Charts wird eine neuartige Methode zur adaptiven Nutzung von a-priori-Information zwischen Iterationen entwickelt, die die Konvergenz verbessert. Dabei wird gezeigt, wie man semi-blinde Kanalschätzung im EXIT chart berücksichtigen kann. In Computersimulationen werden alle Verfahren basierend auf 4G-Systemparametern überprüft.After an introduction, part 2 of this thesis deals with downlink multi-user scheduling for wireless MIMO systems with one transmitting station performing channel adaptive precoding:Different user subsets can be served in each time or frequency resource by separating them in space with different antenna weight vectors. Users with correlated channel matrices should not be served jointly since correlation impairs the spatial separability.The resulting sum rate for each user subset depends on the precoding weights, which in turn depend on the user subset. This thesis manages to decouple this problem by proposing a scheduling metric based on the rate with ZF precoding such as BD, written with the help of orthogonal projection matrices. It allows estimating rates without computing any antenna weights by using a repeated projection approximation.This rate estimate allows considering user rate requirements and fairness criteria and can work with either instantaneous or long term averaged channel knowledge.Search algorithms are presented to efficiently solve user grouping or selection problems jointly for the entire system bandwidth while being able to track the solution in time and frequency for complexity reduction. Part 3 shows how multiple transmitting stations can benefit from cooperative scheduling or joint signal processing. An orthogonal projection based estimate of the inter-site interference power, again without computing any antenna weights, and a virtual user concept extends the scheduling approach to cooperative base stations and finally included SDMA half-duplex relays in the scheduling.Signalling overhead is discussed and a method to estimate the sum rate without coordination. Part 4 presents optimizations for Turbo Equalizers. There, correlation between user signals can be exploited as a source of redundancy. Nevertheless a combination with transmit precoding which aims at reducing correlation can be beneficial when the channel knowledge at the transmitter contains a realistic error, leading to increased correlation. A novel method for adaptive re-use of a-priori information between is developed to increase convergence by tracking the iterations online with EXIT charts.A method is proposed to model semi-blind channel estimation updates in an EXIT chart. Computer simulations with 4G system parameters illustrate the methods using realistic channel models.Im Buchhandel erhältlich: Advances in Multi-User Scheduling and Turbo Equalization for Wireless MIMO Systems / Fuchs-Lautensack,Martin Ilmenau: ISLE, 2009,116 S. ISBN 978-3-938843-43-