An iterative receiver framework for energy-efficient communications with experimental validation

Abstract

Reducing transmit power is the most straightforward way towards more energy-efficient communications, but it results in lower SNRs at the receiver which can add a performance and/or complexity cost. At low SNRs, synchronization and channel estimation errors erode much of the gains achieved through powerful turbo and LDPC codes. Further expanding the turbo concept through an iterative receiver--which brings synchronization and equalization modules inside the loop--can help, but this solution is prohibitively complex and it is not clear what can and what cannot be a part of the iterative structure. This paper fills two important gaps in this field: (1) as compared to previous research which either focuses on a subset of the problem assuming perfect remaining parameters or is computationally too complex, we propose a proper partitioning of algorithm blocks in the iterative receiver for manageable delay and complexity, and (2) to the best of our knowledge, this is the first physical demonstration of an iterative receiver based on experimental radio hardware. We have found that for such a receiver to work, (1) iterative timing synchronization is impractical, iterative carrier synchronization can be avoided by using our proposed approach, while iterative channel estimation is essential, and (2) the SNR gains claimed in previous publications are validated in indoor channels. Finally, we propose a heuristic algorithm for simplifying the carrier phase synchronization in an iterative receiver such that computations of the log likelihood ratios of the parity bits can be avoided to strike a tradeoff between complexity and performance.