Smart cell sectorization for third generation CDMA systems

Smart antennas are a powerful means to provide the increased bandwidth efficiency needed to deliver advanced third generation (3G) interactive multimedia services anywhere and anytime. In this paper we focus on the development of smart antennas located at the base stations of a code division multiple access (CDMA) cellular system. First, we review the main characteristics of antenna array systems and highlight some issues related to the inclusion of smart antennas in a 3G CDMA system. A classification of the proposed beamforming techniques and a discussion on the advantages and drawbacks of smart antennas are provided. Then, we introduce an original smart antenna technique based on rotation and resizing of the available sectors much simpler than common smart antennas based on beamforming techniques addressing a specific user. We discuss on the impact of the proposed technique in the base station architecture. Finally, we provide simulation results in order to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach and to relate transmission performance to system parameters. It turns out that the smart sectorization technique provides significant capacity improvements under statistically uniform user distribution (up to about 80 per cent for data traffic). Copyright (C) 2002 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.

[1]  Francesco Vatalaro,et al.  CDMA cellular systems performance with fading, shadowing, and imperfect power control , 1998 .

[2]  L. Godara.  Application of antenna arrays to mobile communications. II. Beam-forming and direction-of-arrival considerations , 1997, Proc. IEEE.

[3]  Per Hjalmar Lehne,et al.  An Overview of Smart Antenna Technology for Mobile Communications Systems , 1999, IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutorials.

[4]  C. Brunner,et al.  On space-time RAKE receiver structures for WCDMA , 1999, Conference Record of the Thirty-Third Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems, and Computers (Cat. No.CH37020).

[5]  Andrew J. Viterbi,et al.  On the capacity of a cellular CDMA system , 1991 .

[6]  Seshaiah Ponnekanti.  An Overview of Smart Antenna Technology for Heterogeneous Networks , 1999, IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutorials.

[7]  M. Pettersen,et al.  Estimating smart antenna performance from directional radio channel measurements , 1999, Gateway to 21st Century Communications Village. VTC 1999-Fall. IEEE VTS 50th Vehicular Technology Conference (Cat. No.99CH36324).

[8]  Thomas Kailath,et al.  Capacity improvement with base-station antenna arrays in cellular CDMA , 1994 .

[9]  Romeo Giuliano,et al.  Adaptive cell sectorization for UMTS third generation CDMA systems , 2001, IEEE VTS 53rd Vehicular Technology Conference, Spring 2001. Proceedings (Cat. No.01CH37202).

[10]  R.W. Nettleton,et al.  Power control for a spread spectrum cellular mobile radio system , 1983, 33rd IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference.

[11]  Martin Haardt,et al.  Efficient Joint Detection Techniques in the Frequency Domain for Third Generation Mobile Radio Systems , .