Robust transmit beamforming design using outage probability specification

Transmit beamforming (precoding) is a powerful technique for enhancing the channel capacity and reliability of multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) wireless systems. The optimum exploitation of the benefits provided by MIMO systems can be achieved when a perfect channel state information at transmitter (CSIT) is available. In practices, however, the channel knowledge is generally imperfect at transmitter because of the inevitable errors induced by finite feedback channel capacity, quantization and other physical constraints. Such errors degrade the system performance severely. Hence, robustness has become a crucial issue. Current robust designs address the channel imperfections with the worst-case and stochastic approaches. In worst-case analysis, the channel uncertainties are considered as deterministic and norm-bounded, and the resulting design is a conservative optimization that guarantees a certain quality of service (QoS) for every allowable perturbation. The latter approach focuses on the average performance under the assumption of channel statistics, such as mean and covariance. The system performance could break down when persistent extreme errors occur. Thus, an outage probability-based approach is developed by keeping a low probability that channel condition falls below an acceptable level. Compared to the aforementioned methods, this approach can optimize the average performance as well as consider the extreme scenarios proportionally. This thesis implements the outage-probability specification into transmit beamforming design for three scenarios: the single-user MIMO system and the corresponding adaptive modulation scheme as well as the multi-user MIMO system. In a single-user MIMO system, the transmit beamformer provides the maximum average received SNR and ensures the robustness to the CSIT errors by introducing probabilistic constraint on the instantaneous SNR. Beside the robustness against channel imperfections, the outage probability-based approach also provides a tight BER bound for adaptive modulation scheme, so that the maximum transmission rate can be achieved by taking advantage of transmit beamforming. Moreover, in multi-user MIMO (MU-MIMO) systems, the leakage power is accounted by probability measurement. The resulting transmit beamformer is designed based on signal-to-leakage-plus-noise ratio (SLNR) criteria, which maximizes the average received SNR and guarantees the least leakage energy from the desired user. In such a setting, an outstanding BER performance can be achieved as well as high reliability of signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR). Given the superior overall performances and significantly improved robustness, the probabilistic approach provides an attractive alternative to existing robust techniques under imperfect channel information at transmitter. Declaration of originality I hereby declare that the research recorded in this thesis and the thesis itself was composed and originated entirely by myself in the School of Engineering at The University of Edinburgh as a candidate for the Doctorate of Philosophy. I has not been submitted for any other degree or award in any other university or educational institution. List your exceptions here and sign before your printed name. Huiqin Du School of Engineering University of Edinburgh, UK 2010