Large multiuser MIMO detection : algorithms and architectures -

Abstract

After decades of research on multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technology, including paradigm shifts from point-to-point to multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO), an ample literature exists on techniques to exploit the spatial dimension to increase link throughput and network capacity of wireless communication systems. Massive MIMO, which supports hundreds of antennas at the base station (BS), is celebrated as the key enabling technology of the upcoming fifth generation (5G) wireless communication standard. However, the use of large MIMO systems in the future is also indispensable, especially for high-speed wireless backhaul connectivity. Large MIMO systems use tens of antennas in communication terminals, and can afford a large number of antennas on both the transmitter and the receiver sides. While favorable propagation in massive MIMO ensures that reliable performance can be achieved by simple linear processing, the inherent symmetry in large MIMO renders the computational complexity of near-optimal signal processing schemes exponential in the number of antennas. In this thesis, we investigate the problem of efficient data detection in large MIMO and high order MU-MIMO systems. First, near-optimal low-complexity detection algorithms are proposed for regular MIMO systems. Then, a family of low-complexity hard-output and soft-output detection schemes based on channel matrix puncturing targeted for large MIMO systems is proposed. The performance of these schemes is characterized and analyzed mathematically, and bounds on capacity, diversity gain, and probability of bit error are derived. After that, efficient high order MU-MIMO detectors are proposed, based on joint modulation classification and subspace detection, where the modulation type of the interferer is estimated, while multiple decoupled streams are individually detected. Hardware architectures are designed for the proposed algorithms, and the promised gains are verified via simulations. Finally, we map the studied search-based detection schemes to low-resolutio