An empirical analysis of the radio propagation characteristics in high-speed railway environment

Abstract

For a wireless mobile network, a profile of radio propagation characteristics is the key to study any wireless techniques, especially in High-Speed Railway (HSR) environment. Unfortunately, such a profile is not available so far, which leads manifold challenges to wireless study for HSR scenarios. In this paper, we focus on this topic, and try to obtain this profile in various kinds of HSR scenarios based on previous field tests in China. Our study reveals that the Line-Of-Sight (LOS) propagation path plays a predominant role in the HSR scenarios, which can suppress the shadow fading. Finally, we find out that each kind of small-scale fading effects has a unique profile on different wireless mobile systems for HSR scenarios. As a result, this study presents a theoretical guidance for studying any wireless techniques in HSR environment, e.g., cell handover for HSR.