Millimeter wave (mmWave) signals experience orders-of-magnitude more pathloss than the microwave signals currently used in most wireless applications and all cellular systems. MmWave systems must therefore leverage large antenna arrays, made possible by the decrease in wavelength, to combat pathloss with beamforming gain. Beamforming with multiple data streams, known as precoding, can be used to further improve mmWave spectral efficiency. Both beamforming and precoding are done digitally at baseband in traditional multi-antenna systems. The high cost and power consumption of mixed-signal devices in mmWave systems, however, make analog processing in the RF domain more attractive. This hardware limitation restricts the feasible set of precoders and combiners that can be applied by practical mmWave transceivers. In this paper, we consider transmit precoding and receiver combining in mmWave systems with large antenna arrays. We exploit the spatial structure of mmWave channels to formulate the precoding/combining problem as a sparse reconstruction problem. Using the principle of basis pursuit, we develop algorithms that accurately approximate optimal unconstrained precoders and combiners such that they can be implemented in low-cost RF hardware. We present numerical results on the performance of the proposed algorithms and show that they allow mmWave systems to approach their unconstrained performance limits, even when transceiver hardware constraints are considered.

Spatially Sparse Precoding in Millimeter Wave MIMO Systems

The vision of next generation 5G wireless communications lies in providing very high data rates (typically of Gbps order), extremely low latency, manifold increase in base station capacity, and significant improvement in users’ perceived quality of service (QoS), compared to current 4G LTE networks. Ever increasing proliferation of smart devices, introduction of new emerging multimedia applications, together with an exponential rise in wireless data (multimedia) demand and usage is already creating a significant burden on existing cellular networks. 5G wireless systems, with improved data rates, capacity, latency, and QoS are expected to be the panacea of most of the current cellular networks’ problems. In this survey, we make an exhaustive review of wireless evolution toward 5G networks. We first discuss the new architectural changes associated with the radio access network (RAN) design, including air interfaces, smart antennas, cloud and heterogeneous RAN. Subsequently, we make an in-depth survey of underlying novel mm-wave physical layer technologies, encompassing new channel model estimation, directional antenna design, beamforming algorithms, and massive MIMO technologies. Next, the details of MAC layer protocols and multiplexing schemes needed to efficiently support this new physical layer are discussed. We also look into the killer applications, considered as the major driving force behind 5G. In order to understand the improved user experience, we provide highlights of new QoS, QoE, and SON features associated with the 5G evolution. For alleviating the increased network energy consumption and operating expenditure, we make a detail review on energy awareness and cost efficiency. As understanding the current status of 5G implementation is important for its eventual commercialization, we also discuss relevant field trials, drive tests, and simulation experiments. Finally, we point out major existing research issues and identify possible future research directions.

Next Generation 5G Wireless Networks: A Comprehensive Survey

Millimeter wave (mmWave) cellular systems will enable gigabit-per-second data rates thanks to the large bandwidth available at mmWave frequencies. To realize sufficient link margin, mmWave systems will employ directional beamforming with large antenna arrays at both the transmitter and receiver. Due to the high cost and power consumption of gigasample mixed-signal devices, mmWave precoding will likely be divided among the analog and digital domains. The large number of antennas and the presence of analog beamforming requires the development of mmWave-specific channel estimation and precoding algorithms. This paper develops an adaptive algorithm to estimate the mmWave channel parameters that exploits the poor scattering nature of the channel. To enable the efficient operation of this algorithm, a novel hierarchical multi-resolution codebook is designed to construct training beamforming vectors with different beamwidths. For single-path channels, an upper bound on the estimation error probability using the proposed algorithm is derived, and some insights into the efficient allocation of the training power among the adaptive stages of the algorithm are obtained. The adaptive channel estimation algorithm is then extended to the multi-path case relying on the sparse nature of the channel. Using the estimated channel, this paper proposes a new hybrid analog/digital precoding algorithm that overcomes the hardware constraints on the analog-only beamforming, and approaches the performance of digital solutions. Simulation results show that the proposed low-complexity channel estimation algorithm achieves comparable precoding gains compared to exhaustive channel training algorithms. The results illustrate that the proposed channel estimation and precoding algorithms can approach the coverage probability achieved by perfect channel knowledge even in the presence of interference.

Channel Estimation and Hybrid Precoding for Millimeter Wave Cellular Systems

With the explosive growth of mobile data demand, the fifth generation (5G) mobile network would exploit the enormous amount of spectrum in the millimeter wave (mmWave) bands to greatly increase communication capacity. There are fundamental differences between mmWave communications and existing other communication systems, in terms of high propagation loss, directivity, and sensitivity to blockage. These characteristics of mmWave communications pose several challenges to fully exploit the potential of mmWave communications, including integrated circuits and system design, interference management, spatial reuse, anti-blockage, and dynamics control. To address these challenges, we carry out a survey of existing solutions and standards, and propose design guidelines in architectures and protocols for mmWave communications. We also discuss the potential applications of mmWave communications in the 5G network, including the small cell access, the cellular access, and the wireless backhaul. Finally, we discuss relevant open research issues including the new physical layer technology, software-defined network architecture, measurements of network state information, efficient control mechanisms, and heterogeneous networking, which should be further investigated to facilitate the deployment of mmWave communication systems in the future 5G networks.

A survey of millimeter wave communications (mmWave) for 5G: opportunities and challenges

Antenna arrays will be an important ingredient in millimeter-wave (mmWave) cellular systems. A natural application of antenna arrays is simultaneous transmission to multiple users. Unfortunately, the hardware constraints in mmWave systems make it difficult to apply conventional lower frequency multiuser MIMO precoding techniques at mmWave. This paper develops low-complexity hybrid analog/digital precoding for downlink multiuser mmWave systems. Hybrid precoding involves a combination of analog and digital processing that is inspired by the power consumption of complete radio frequency and mixed signal hardware. The proposed algorithm configures hybrid precoders at the transmitter and analog combiners at multiple receivers with a small training and feedback overhead. The performance of the proposed algorithm is analyzed in the large dimensional regime and in single-path channels. When the analog and digital precoding vectors are selected from quantized codebooks, the rate loss due to the joint quantization is characterized, and insights are given into the performance of hybrid precoding compared with analog-only beamforming solutions. Analytical and simulation results show that the proposed techniques offer higher sum rates compared with analog-only beamforming solutions, and approach the performance of the unconstrained digital beamforming with relatively small codebooks.

Limited Feedback Hybrid Precoding for Multi-User Millimeter Wave Systems

Uncompressed high-definition video streaming over wireless personal area networks is a challenging problem because of the high data rate requirement and channel variations. With the advances in RF technology and the huge bandwidth available worldwide in the 57-66 GHz millimeter-wave unlicensed spectrum, mmWave WPANs that can support multigigabit transmission are being developed. However, compared to low-frequency signals (2.4 or 5 GHz), mmWave signals are more fragile; indeed, the propagation losses are significantly higher. In this article we present an mmWave system for supporting uncompressed HD video up to 3 Gb/s. The system includes various efficient error protection and concealment schemes that exploit unequal error resilience properties of uncompressed video. Some of them have been adopted in the emerging 60 GHz WPAN standards such as WirelessHD, ECMA TC48, and IEEE 802.15.3c. Simulations using real uncompressed HD images indicate that the proposed mmWave system can maintain, under poor channel conditions, good average peak-signal-to-noise-ratio and low video quality metric scores.

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A 60 GHz wireless network for enabling uncompressed video communication

We study spatial division multiple access in 60 GHz millimeter wave communications and focus on estimation of the optimal transmit beamforming vectors for stations and optimal receive beamforming vectors for the access point. An iterative antenna training protocol is developed, where the optimal transmit/ receive beamforming vectors are computed without explicit knowledge of the actual wireless channels. The proposed training method is especially attractive to systems with a much smaller number of RF chains relative to the number of antenna elements, thanks to its low training overhead.

A practical SDMA protocol for 60 GHz millimeter wave communications

In this paper, we discuss multi-gigabits per second wireless networks in the 60GHz millimeter wave frequency band. Despite the large unlicensed bandwidth offered by the 60GHz frequency band, severe technical challenges exist towards making multi-Gbps a reality. We discuss the challenges in three different layers: PHY, MAC and the application layers. We also discuss some important technologies in overcoming these challenges, including antenna array beamforming, baseband modulation, data aggregation. The worldwide 60GHz regulatory and the ongoing standardization efforts are reviewed as well.

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Short Range Gigabit Wireless Communications Systems: Potentials, Challenges and Techniques

We study 60 GHz millimeter wave communication systems employing SVD based transmit precoding and receive combining, and propose a multi-stage iterative method in training the antenna coefficients. The antenna training is carried out in multiple stages one after another, while each stage features an iterative process based on the power iteration principle. Null space projection is used as an enabling step for iterative training in inner stages. The proposed training method is especially efficient for systems with a much smaller number of RF chains relative to the number of antennas on both transmitter and receiver sides.

Multi-Stage Iterative Antenna Training for Millimeter Wave Communications

A beacon packet is provided. The packet includes a first information field that includes channel-time-allocation information in a wireless network; and information about whether there is residual channel time that can be allocated to a device that belongs to the wireless network.

Ji-sung Oh

Papers

A 60 GHz wireless network for enabling uncompressed video communication

A practical SDMA protocol for 60 GHz millimeter wave communications

Short Range Gigabit Wireless Communications Systems: Potentials, Challenges and Techniques

Multi-Stage Iterative Antenna Training for Millimeter Wave Communications

Method and apparatus for wireless communication in high-frequency band