Parametric Near-Field Channel Estimation for Extremely Large Aperture Arrays

Accurate channel estimation is critical to fully exploit the beamforming gains when communicating with extremely large aperture arrays. The propagation distances between the user and receiver, which potentially has thousands of antennas/elements, are such that they are located in the radiative near-field region of each other when considering the Fraunhofer distance of the entire array. Therefore, it is imperative to consider near-field effects to achieve proper channel estimation. This paper proposes a parametric multi-user near-field channel estimation algorithm based on MUltiple SIgnal Classification (MUSIC) method to obtain the essential parameters describing the users' locations. We derive the estimated channel by incorporating the estimated parameters into the near-field channel model. Additionally, we implement a least-squares-based estimation corrector, resulting in a precise near-field channel estimation. Simulation results demonstrate that our proposed scheme outperforms classical least-squares and minimum mean-square error channel estimation methods in terms of normalized beamforming gain and normalized mean-square error.

Nonlinear Distortion Radiated from Large Arrays and Active Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces

Extremely large aperture arrays (ELAAs) and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) are candidate enablers to realize connectivity goals for the sixth-generation (6G) wireless networks. For instance, ELAAs can provide orders-of-magnitude higher area throughput compared to what massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) can deliver through spatial multiplexing, while RISs can improve the propagation conditions over wireless channels but a passively reflecting RIS must be large to be effective. Active RIS with amplifiers can deal with this issue. In this paper, we study the distortion created by nonlinear amplifiers in both ELAAs and active RIS. We analytically obtain the angular directions and depth of the nonlinear distortion in both near- and far-field channels. The results are demonstrated numerically and we conclude that non-linearities can both create in-band and out-of-band distortion that is beamformed in entirely new directions and distances from the transmitter.

Optimal Dual-Polarized Planar Arrays for Massive Capacity Over Point-to-Point MIMO Channels

Future wireless networks must provide ever higher data rates. The available bandwidth increases roughly linearly as we increase the carrier frequency, but the range shrinks drastically. This paper explores if we can instead reach massive capacities using spatial multiplexing over multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels. In line-of-sight (LOS) scenarios, therank of the MIMO channel matrix depends on the polarization and antenna arrangement. We optimize the rank and condition number by identifying the optimal antenna spacing in dual-polarized planar antenna arrays with imperfect isolation. The result is sparely spaced antenna arrays that exploit radiative near-field properties. We further optimize the array geometry for minimum aperture length and aperture area, which leads to different configurations. Moreover, we prove analytically that for fixed-sized arrays, the MIMO rank grows quadratically with the carrier frequency in LOS scenarios, if the antennas are appropriately designed. Hence, MIMO technology contributes more to the capacity growth than the bandwidth. The numerical results show that massive data rates, far beyond 1 Tbps, can be reached both over fixed point-to-point links. It is also possible for a large base station to serve a practically-sized mobile device.

Massive Spatial Multiplexing: Vision, Foundations, and Challenges

In this article, we present our vision for how extremely large aperture arrays (ELAAs), equipped with hundreds or thousands of antennas, can play a major role in future 6G networks by enabling a remarkable increase in data rates through massive spatial multiplexing to both a single user and many simultaneous users. Specifically, with the quantum leap in the array aperture size, the users will be in the so-called radiative near-field region of the array, where previously negligible physical phenomena dominate the propagation conditions and give the channel matrices more favorable properties. This article presents the foundational properties of communication in the radiative near-field region and then exemplifies how these properties enable two unprecedented spatial multiplexing schemes: depth-domain multiplexing of multiple users and angular multiplexing of data streams to a single user. We also highlight research challenges and open problems that require further investigation.

Finite Beam Depth Analysis for Large Arrays

Most wireless communication systems operate in the far-field region of antennas and antenna arrays, where waves are planar and beams have infinite depth. When antenna arrays become electrically large, it is possible that the receiver is in the radiative near-field of the transmitter, and vice versa. Recent works have shown that near-field beamforming exhibits a finite depth, which enables a new depth-based spatial multiplexing paradigm. In this paper, we explore how the shape and size of an array determine the near-field beam behaviors. In particular, we investigate the 3 dB beam depth (BD), defined as the range of distances where the gain is greater than half of the peak gain. We derive analytical gain and BD expressions and prove how they depend on the aperture area and length. For non-broadside transmissions, we find that the BD increases as the transmitter approaches the end-fire direction of the array. Furthermore, it is sufficient to characterize the BD for a broadside transmitter, as the beam pattern with a non-broadside transmitter can be approximated by that of a smaller/projected array with a broadside transmitter. Our analysis demonstrates that the BD can be ordered from smallest to largest as ULA, circular, and square arrays.

Untrained Neural Network based Bayesian Detector for OTFS Modulation Systems

The orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS) symbol detector design for high mobility communication scenarios has received numerous attention lately. Current state-of-the-art OTFS detectors mainly can be divided into two categories; iterative and training-based deep neural network (DNN) detectors. Many practical iterative detectors rely on minimum-mean-square-error (MMSE) denoiser to get the initial symbol estimates. However, their computational complexity increases exponentially with the number of detected symbols. Training-based DNN detectors typically suffer from dependency on the availability of large computation resources and the fidelity of synthetic datasets for the training phase, which are both costly. In this paper, we propose an untrained DNN based on the deep image prior (DIP) and decoder architecture, referred to as D-DIP that replaces the MMSE denoiser in the iterative detector. DIP is a type of DNN that requires no training, which makes it beneficial in OTFS detector design. Then we propose to combine the D-DIP denoiser with the Bayesian parallel interference cancellation (BPIC) detector to perform iterative symbol detection, referred to as D-DIP-BPIC. Our simulation results show that the symbol error rate (SER) performance of the proposed D-DIP-BPIC detector outperforms practical state-of-the-art detectors by 0.5 dB and retains low computational complexity.

Bayesian Neural Network Detector for an Orthogonal Time Frequency Space Modulation

The orthogonal time-frequency space (OTFS) modulation is proposed for beyond 5G wireless systems to deal with high mobility communications. The existing low complexity OTFS detectors exhibit poor performance in rich scattering environments where there are a large number of moving reflectors that reflect the transmitted signal towards the receiver. In this paper, we propose an OTFS detector, referred to as the BPICNet OTFS detector that integrates NN, Bayesian inference, and parallel interference cancellation concepts. Simulation results show that the proposed OTFS detector significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art.

Graph Neural Network Aided MU-MIMO Detectors

Multi-user multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) systems can be used to meet high throughput requirements of 5G and beyond networks. A base station serves many users in an uplink MU-MIMO system, leading to a substantial multi-user interference (MUI). Designing a high-performance detector for dealing with a strong MUI is challenging. This paper analyses the performance degradation caused by the posterior distribution approximation used in the state-of-the-art message passing (MP) detectors in the presence of high MUI. We develop a graph neural network based framework to fine-tune the MP detectors' cavity distributions and thus improve the posterior distribution approximation in the MP detectors. We then propose two novel neural network based detectors which rely on the expectation propagation (EP) and Bayesian parallel interference cancellation (BPIC), referred to as the GEPNet and GPICNet detectors, respectively. The GEPNet detector maximizes detection performance, while GPICNet detector balances the performance and complexity. We provide proof of the permutation equivariance property, allowing the detectors to be trained only once, even in the systems with dynamic changes of the number of users. The simulation results show that the proposed GEPNet detector performance approaches maximum likelihood performance in various configurations and GPICNet detector doubles the multiplexing gain of BPIC detector.

Graph Neural Network Aided Expectation Propagation Detector for MU-MIMO Systems

Multiuser massive multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) systems can be used to meet high throughput requirements of 5G and beyond networks. In an uplink MUMIMO system, a base station is serving a large number of users, leading to a strong multi-user interference (MUI). Designing a high performance detector in the presence of a strong MUI is a challenging problem. This work proposes a novel detector based on the concepts of expectation propagation (EP) and graph neural network, referred to as the GEPNet detector, addressing the limitation of the independent Gaussian approximation in EP. The simulation results show that the proposed GEPNet detector significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art MU-MIMO detectors in strong MUI scenarios with equal number of transmit and receive antennas.