Link Performance Improvement Using Reconfigurable Multi-Antenna Systems

• NCJ Number: 249139
• Author(s): Chitaranjan P. Sukumar; Hamid Ealami; Ahmed M. Eltawil; Bedri A. Cetiner
• Date Published: May 2009
• Length: 4 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2007-IJ-CX-K025; 2009-SQ-B9-K005
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical); Report (Technical); Report (Study/Research); Report (Grant Sponsored)
• Award: NEMS Integrated Reconfigurable Antenna operating at 150, 400, 700, 800, and 4900 MHz bands for Interoperable Public Safety Communications; MEMS Integrated MRA for Use in Multi-functional MRA System

Annotation

This study examined the link performance improvement achievable through the use of multifunctional reconfigurable antennas (MRAs).

Abstract

A significant amount of work has been done in characterizing performance gains of MRAs with various reconfiguration capabilities; however, most of the published work has not been in the context of statistical channel models that are typically used in evaluating wireless algorithms. In addressing this need, the crrent study examined capacity and symbol error rate (SER) of beam-tilting MRAs, using statistical channel models. A framework is presented that links a generic channel model, reconfigurable antennas, and the performance gains achieved.. The results show that by using a reconfigurable multiple-antenna system, it is possible to maintain system performance with a reduced number of RF chains. The study observed that for the low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region, the performance of systems with MRAs with a fewer number of RF chains is superior to that of legacy multiple antenna systems with more RF chains. At high SNR, however, this advantage is overshadowed due to gains obtained from higher diversity order. For the same number of antennas, systems equipped with MRAs outperformed systems with conventional antennas across all SNRs. Capacity and SER improvements using MRAs are presented for the following multiple-antenna systems: maximum ratio combining, beam forming, spatial multiplexing, and space-time block coding. 3 figures and 14 references