Characteristics of L-band multipath fading due to sea surface reflection

For lowG/Tship-based earth stations in future maritime satellite communications, the effect of multipath fading due to sea surface reflection will be very important at low elevation angles. However, a practical model of theL-band multipath fading for fade prediction has not been available so far. A practical fading model is presented based on the shadowed Kirchhoff approximation theory for the coherent and incoherent components of the scattered power as a function of sea surface conditions. Using this model, theoretical fading depths are presented as a function of elevation angle, wave height, and antenna gain. The results indicate that intense fading occurs for wave heights greater than 50 cm, and the dependence on wave height is small under these conditions atL-band frequencies. Theoretical results presented agree well with experimental results obtained by field experiments.     

Frequency-Selective Fading Effects in Digital Mobile Radio with Diversity Combining

we analyze the effects of frequency-selective fading in a cellular mobile radio system that uses 1) phase-shift keying (PSK) with cosine rolloff pulses, and 2) space diversity with maximal-radio combining. The distorting phenomena with which we deal are multipath fading (which produces the frequency selectivity), shadow fading, and cochannel interference. The relevant quality measure is defined to be the bit error rate averaged over the multipath fading, denoted by (BER). The relevant system performance characteristic is defined to be the probability distribution for (BER), taken over the ensemble of shadow fadings and locations of the desired and interfering mobiles. To obtain numerical results, we use a combination of analysis and Monte Carlo simulation, invoke widely accepted models for the multipath and shadow fadings, and assume a cellular system with seven channel sets and centrally located base stations. The outcome is a set of performance curves that reveal the influences of various system and channel parameters. These include: the number of modulation levels (two or four), the diversity order, the shape of the multipath delay spectrum, and the standard deviation (or delay spread, τ0) of the multipath delay spectrum. Practical factors accounted for in these assessments include fading- and interference-related timing recovery errors and combiner imperfections. Our results highlight the importance of the ratiotau_{0}/T, whereTis the digital symbol period. They show that the delay spectrum shape is of no importance fortau_{0}/T leq 0.2, but can have a profound influence fortau_{0}/T geq 0.3. We also find that using 4-PSK leads to better detection performance, in certain cases, than using 2-PSK.     

Cellular channel modeling and the performance of DS-CDMA systemswith antenna arrays

In this paper, a new channel modeling approach incorporating nonuniform propagation environments is introduced, and the bit error rate (BER) of a direct sequence code division multiple access cellular system incorporating antenna arrays for spatial filtering is derived analytically. Specifically, this paper introduces a channel model for, and analyzes the performance of, a system in an environment where the multipath signals on each of the diversity branches of a RAKE receiver have varying fading characteristics. This scenario would typically describe urban environments where a large number of multipath echoes are present, each with different fading statistics resulting from the nonhomogeneous propagation paths seen by each multipath echo. It is shown that nonuniform fading parameters for multipath signals can severely influence the system performance, especially at high E_b /N₀ levels. Furthermore, it is shown that the conventional assumption of identical fading statistics for all RAKE receiver branches provide a lower bound on the system performance     

Experiment on coherent adaptive antenna array for wideband DS-CDMAmobile radio

A four-element pilot symbol-assisted coherent adaptive antenna array diversity receiver for 4.096 Mchip/s wideband direct sequence code division multiple access mobile radio is implemented and its performance in a multipath fading environment is evaluated by a laboratory experiment using hardware fading simulators. The receiver comprises an adaptive antenna array using the normalised least mean square algorithm and Rake combiner. It is demonstrated that, for the three-user case, the required average signal-to-interference ratio obtaining average BER of 10^-3 can be reduced by ~8 dB compared to four-branch antenna diversity     

Forward Error Correction Coding for Fading Compensation in Mobile Satellite Channels

Fading in mobile satellite communications severely degrades the performance of data transmission. The channel is modeled with nonfrequency selective Rice and Rayleigh fading. Also, stored channel simulation is used for hardware data transmission. FEC coding with Viterbi decoding of convolutional codes, and Berlekamp-Massey decoding of Reed-Solomon codes, are used to compensate for the fading. In addition to interleaving, channel state and erasure information improve the performance of the decoder. The BER after decoding is calculated for specific codes on several channels and for different transmission schemes. Using very simple channel state and erasure information gives 2-7 dB additional coding gain. These gains have been verified by hardware data transmission on synthetic fading channels and stored mobile satellite channels.     

BER performance of CMA adaptive array for high-speed GMSK mobilecommunication-a description of measurements in central Tokyo

This paper describes the performance of an adaptive array as a countermeasure to multipath fading for a 256 kbps Gaussian-filtered minimum shift keying (GMSK) mobile communication system operating in the 1.5 GHz band. An adaptive array having four antenna elements is implemented using the digital beam forming concept. The constant modulus algorithm (CMA) is employed for the adaptation process to ease the implementation. Measurements in central Tokyo of the bit error rate (BER) performance and an array pattern arising in the multipath environment are presented. Analysis of the array pattern confirms that the array succeeds in directing nulls to the delayed signals. BER performance shows an improvement in E_b/N₀, compared with that of a single antenna system, of 17.5 to 22 dB at a BER of 1.0×10^-2 in a frequency-selective fading channel     

Sequential sequence estimation for trellis-coded modulation onmultipath fading ISI channels

A new receiver structure is proposed for trellis-coded modulation on multipath fading intersymbol interference (ISI) channels that permits the use of large-state trellis codes. The receiver uses a sequential sequence estimator with the Fano algorithm, and a channel estimator consisting of a fast nonrecursive start-up algorithm for training and the LMS algorithm for tracking. During the tracking mode, the channel estimates are updated dynamically by using recent tentative decisions produced by the sequential sequence estimator. This approach results in good tracking even on rapidly varying channels, and reduces the degradation in performance of the sequential sequence estimator due to channel estimation error. The effect of fading is mitigated using both implicit time diversity in the form of interleaved trellis-coded modulation and explicit antenna diversity     

A Quasi-Random Approach to Space–Time Codes

This paper presents a quasi-random approach to space–time (ST) codes. The basic principle is to transmit randomly interleaved versions of forward error correction (FEC)-coded sequences simultaneously from all antennas in a multilayer structure. This is conceptually simple, yet still very effective. It is also flexible regarding the transmission rate, antenna numbers, and channel conditions (e.g., with intersymbol interference). It provides a unified solution to various applications where the traditional ST codes may encounter difficulties. We outline turbo-type iterative joint detection and equalization algorithms with complexity (per FEC-coded bit) growing linearly with the transmit antenna number and independently of the layer number. We develop a signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) evolution technique and a bounding technique to assess the performance of the proposed code in fixed and quasi-static fading channels, respectively. These performance assessment techniques are very simple and reasonably accurate. Using these techniques as a searching tool, efficient power allocation strategies are examined, which can greatly enhance the system performance. Simulation results show that the proposed code can achieve near-capacity performance with both low and high rates at low decoding complexity.      

The Effect of Multipath Interference on the Performance of a Digital Matched Filter

We analyze the performance of a one-bit digital matched filter (DMF) responding to binary signaling through a noisy multipath channel. The output signal-to-noise ratio(SNR_{o})plays a key role in the analysis. The SNRoperformance is fully studied for a two-path channel, both fading and non-fading. For the generalN-path channel, results are obtained only for the fading case. All results are conditioned on the knowledge of the time delays of all paths, and are valid only for small input signal-to-noise ratio(SNR_{i). Most of the results have been verified by computer simulations.     

An implementation of a CMA adaptive array for high speed GMSKtransmission in mobile communications

The hardware implementation of an adaptive array as a technique for compensating multipath fading in mobile communications is described. The number of the antenna elements is four. The target communication system is modulated by 256 kbps Gaussian-filtered minimum shift keying (MSK) and has a time-division multiplexing (TDM) architecture with 24 time slots. Based on the digital beamforming concept, all of the signals and the array weights are digital-signal processed. The constant modulus algorithm (CMA) is employed for weight optimizing. In an additive white Gaussian noise channel, this system has 5.6-dB gain in an energy-per-bit-to-noise-density ratio at a bit error rate (BER) of 1.0×10^-3, compared with a single antenna system. The result of the basic field test shows that the gain at a BER of 1.0×10^-3 reaches 22.3 dB in a nonselective, slow Rayleigh fading channel given a 5 Hz maximum Doppler shift     

A Gaussian channel with slow fading (Corresp.)

An interleaved fading channel whose state is known to the receiver is analyzed. The reliability functionE(R)is obtained for ratesRin the rangeR_c leq R leq C. The capacity is shown to beC = E_A { frac{1}{2} ln (1 + A^2 n)}whereAis a factor describing the fading mechanism anduis the signal-to-noise ratio per dimension.     

Characteristics of sea reflection fading in maritime satellite communications

The Japanese domestic experimental mobile satellite system (EMSS) has been studied to establish high quality channels for small vessels with compact and low-gain antennas. The present international maritime satellite communication system (INMARSAT) has also been studied for the next generation to extend services for small ships, for which the present ship terminals including the antenna systems are too large and too heavy. By using a low-gain antenna, however, multipath fading caused by sea reflections will become a serious problem in designing the new system. To take effective countermeasures to the fading effect, it is very important to get a better knowledge of the fading phenomena caused by sea reflections. From a standpoint of maritime satellite communications, experiments measuring the amount of fading were performed under various sea conditions and in two frequency bands. The wave height, which is considered the most important experimental parameter, was measured objectively by a wave rider buoy. The experimental results show that the amount of fading depends on a wave height and radio frequency and, as the most interesting result, as a wave increases above a certain level, the amount of fading decreases. These results are also discussed theoretically.     

Performance Improvement by Microdiversity for Wideband Signals in Frequency Selective Fading Indoor Channels with Co-Channel Interference

A comprehensive analytical bit-error-rate (BER) model is presented to analyse the performance of antenna-microdiversity for wideband BPSK modulated signals in the frequency selective fading multipath channel, specified by its complex impulse response. The model includes the disturbance by intersymbol interference (ISI) and co-channel interference (CCI), as well as the channels' impact on the carrier phase- and clock recovery in the receiver. The channel impulse responses at the antenna elements are determined by taking into account the direction of arrival of the individual paths. Computational BER- and SNIR-gain results (SNIR = signal-to-noise+interference-ratio) show that a substantial performance improvement is achieved with antenna combining for wideband signals which suffer ISI and/or CCI. For the indoor multipath channel with exponentially decaying power delay profile, the performance enhancement is compared for several antenna combining schemes. Quasi-coherent equal gain combining (QCEGC) is proposed as an novel EGC scheme based on a less accurate phase estimation technique. For wideband signals, QCEGC shows a slight performance degradation when compared to maximal ratio combining or minimum mean square error combining (MMSEC), but has a much lower implementation complexity. In the channel with CCI, where the best performance is achieved with MMSEC, QCEGC performs very poor.     

Space-time block-coded multiple access through frequency-selectivefading channels

Mitigation of multipath fading effects and suppression of multiuser interference (MUI) constitute major challenges in the design of wide-band third-generation wireless mobile systems. Space-time (ST) coding offers an effective transmit-antenna diversity technique to combat fading, but most existing ST coding schemes assume flat fading channels that may not be valid for wide-band communications. Single-user ST coded orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing transmissions over frequency-selective channels suffer from finite-impulse response channel nulls (fades). Especially multiuser ST block-coded transmissions through (perhaps unknown) multipath present unique challenges in suppressing not only MUI but also intersymbol/chip interference. In this paper, we design ST multiuser transceivers suitable for coping with frequency-selective multipath channels (downlink or uplink). Relying on symbol blocking and a single-receive antenna, ST block codes are derived and MUI is eliminated without destroying the orthogonality of ST block codes. The system is shown capable of providing transmit diversity while guaranteeing symbol recovery in multiuser environments, regardless of unknown multipath. Unlike existing approaches, the mobile does not need to know the channel of other users. In addition to decoding simplicity, analytic evaluation and corroborating simulations reveal its flexibility and performance merits     

Space diversity in presence of discrete multipath fading channel

Most analytical studies of the performance of space diversity systems on fading channels assume a very rich multipath environment. In certain wireless applications, however, the number of significant multipath components can be small. In this letter, we consider a multipath channel in which the signal propagates from the transmitter to the receiver via L discrete paths which are uniformly distributed about the transmitter and receiver. For this channel, we study the effects of the number of multipath components and antenna array size on the error probability and outage capacity of space diversity systems. We observe that performance is significantly influenced by the presence of a channel with few multipath components.     

Signaling and multiple access techniques for ultra wideband 4G wireless communication systems

Due to the demanding performance requirements for fourth-generation wireless systems, several technologies have been considered for replacing third-generation wireless systems. Potential technologies for fourth-generation wireless systems are ultra wideband, orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing, and multi-input multi-output antenna systems. Ultra wideband is of particular interest for fourth-generation wireless applications that emphasize short range, high data rate, and/or low power. We focus on ultra wideband radio due to its unique advantages: high data rate, low power, and resilience to multipath fading effects. We discuss the signal characteristics, channel propagation, modulation schemes, and hardware implementation. Two major approaches to ultra wideband signaling, impulse-based and multicarrier ultra wideband, are elaborated. Furthermore, two categories of multiple access are also considered: distributed and centralized.     

Characteristic‐Function‐Based Analysis of MIMO Systems Applying Macroscopic Selection Diversity in Mobile Communications

Multiple‐input multiple‐output (MIMO) systems can provide significant increments in capacity; however, the capacity of MIMO systems degrades severely when spatial correlation among multipath channels is present. This paper demonstrates that the influence of shadowing on the channel capacity is more substantial than that of multipath fading; therefore, the shadowing effect is actually the dominant impairment. To overcome the composite fading effects, we propose combining macroscopic selection diversity (MSD) schemes with MIMO technology. To analyze the system performance, the capacity outage expression of MIMO‐based MSD (MSD‐MIMO) systems using a characteristic function is applied. The analytic results show that there are significant improvements when MSD schemes are applied, even for the two‐base‐station diversity case. It is also observed that the effect of spatial correlation due to multipath fading is almost negligible when multiple base stations cooperatively participate in the mobile communication topology.     

Satellite forward VDES channel modeling and impact on higher-layer performance

VHF data exchange system (VDES) is an emerging maritime communications standard that is meant to provide ship-to-shore, shore-to-ship, and ship-to-ship information services. VDES also includes a satellite component to extend the service coverage also to the high sea. Ships can receive important information via VDES and access this service via satellite when they are far from the shore. This paper uses data taken during a measurement campaign to develop an ON-OFF model for the VDE-SAT downlink channel taking the multipath effects caused by sea reflections into account. This model has been used to evaluate the impact of packet-level forward error correction (FEC) schemes (i.e., ideal codes, RaptorQ codes, and 2-Dimension Reed-Solomon codes) to further protect transmissions from deep fading events and to evaluate the impact at the transport level considering the possibility to adopt the transmission control protocol (TCP) for a file map delivery service.     

On the asymptotic performance of threshold-based acquisition systems in multipath fading channels

The asymptotic performance of timing acquisition systems having fixed dwell time in multipath fading channels is investigated. The detrimental effect of the multipath channel fading on the acquisition performance is isolated by considering the asymptotic performance as the average signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) increases. It is found that for any threshold such that the average probability of false alarm is less than a given tolerance, the channel fading results in a lower bound on the asymptotic average probability of miss which is nontrivial for a variety of fading scenarios. A threshold-based direct-sequence spread-spectrum signal acquisition system is considered and it is found that the detrimental effect of channel fading on asymptotic acquisition performance, albeit nontrivial, is not very significant. The asymptotic acquisition performance of two threshold-based acquisition schemes for ultra-wideband (UWB) signals with time-hopping (TH) spreading are also evaluated and compared. For both schemes, the detrimental effect of the channel fading on the asymptotic acquisition performance turns out to be significant.     

复合衰落信道建模及模拟方法研究

针对传统信道模拟器仅考虑多径衰落的问题,建立了包含路径损耗、阴影衰落和多径衰落的复合衰落信道模型,提出了一种基于高斯变量分解和谐波叠加原理的硬件模拟方法,推导了该方法输出衰落幅值理论分布与仿真参数的内在联系,并详细分析了可编程逻辑器件定点化模型输出周期性及位宽选择等问题。针对原型化模拟器的实测结果表明,该模拟方法输出信道衰落的统计特性与理论值吻合,可用于实验室中无线通信系统的性能测试和验证。