The Multicell Multiuser MIMO Uplink with Very Large Antenna Arrays and a Finite-Dimensional Channel

• Published in: IEEE transactions on communications Vol. 61; no. 6; pp. 2350 - 2361
• Main Authors: Ngo, H. Q., Larsson, E. G., Marzetta, T. L.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, NY IEEE 01.06.2013; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Antenna arrays; Antennas; Applied sciences; Arrays; Bins; Channel estimation; Channel models; Channels; Communication Systems; Contamination; Detection, estimation, filtering, equalization, prediction; Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering; Elektroteknik och elektronik; Engineering and Technology; Exact sciences and technology; Finite-dimensional channel; Information, signal and communications theory; Kommunikationssystem; Lower bounds; Mathematical analysis; MIMO; multicell mutiuser MIMO; pilot contamination; Pilots; Product introduction; Radiocommunications; Signal and communications theory; Signal Processing; Signal, noise; Signalbehandling; Stations; Studies; Systems, networks and services of telecommunications; Teknik och teknologier; Telecommunications; Telecommunications and information theory; Transmission and modulation (techniques and equipments); Uplink; very large MIMO systems; Performance evaluation; MIMO system; Multiple access; Lower bound; pilot contamination; Parameter estimation; Base station; Measurement sensor; Data transmission; Finite-dimensional channel; very large MIMO systems; Learning; Diversity combining; Channel estimation; Numerical simulation; multicell mutiuser MIMO; Uplink; Antenna array; Antenna; Large scale system
• ISSN: 0090-6778; 1558-0857; 1558-0857
• DOI: 10.1109/TCOMM.2013.032713.120408

We consider multicell multiuser MIMO systems with a very large number of antennas at the base station (BS). We assume that the channel is estimated by using uplink training. We further consider a physical channel model where the angular domain is separated into a finite number of distinct directions. We analyze the so-called pilot contamination effect discovered in previous work, and show that this effect persists under the finite-dimensional channel model that we consider. In particular, we consider a uniform array at the BS. For this scenario, we show that when the number of BS antennas goes to infinity, the system performance under a finite-dimensional channel model with P angular bins is the same as the performance under an uncorrelated channel model with P antennas. We further derive a lower bound on the achievable rate of uplink data transmission with a linear detector at the BS. We then specialize this lower bound to the cases of maximum-ratio combining (MRC) and zero-forcing (ZF) receivers, for a finite and an infinite number of BS antennas. Numerical results corroborate our analysis and show a comparison between the performances of MRC and ZF in terms of sum-rate.