Matrix Coded Modulation: A New Non-coherent MIMO Scheme

Abstract

This paper describes a new space-time coding scheme for non-coherent multi-antenna multi-input multi-output (MIMO) systems. This new MIMO scheme merges error-correcting and space-time coding functions by transmitting invertible matrices, so this scheme has been called "Matrix Coded Modulation" or "MCM". Coherent systems require channel state information (CSI) at the transmitters and/or at the receivers, and their performances strongly depend on the channel estimation. For example, in systems using Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing, the channel estimation requires the insertion of pilot-symbols in the transmitted frame which implies a spectral efficiency loss of the global system that increase with the number of transmit antennas. The existing non-coherent schemes such as the differential space-time modulation leads to performance degradation compared to coherent systems in which perfect CSI is assumed. Decoding in the MCM scheme is performed iteratively, based on a specified detection criteria. In the proposed MCM scheme, decoding can be achieved with or without CSI at the receiving antennas. As the space-time coding function is merged with the error-correcting code, the euclidean distances distribution between modulated signals based on the detection criteria is strongly linked to the Hamming weights distribution of the channel error-correcting code used in the MCM scheme. Moreover, a low-complexity decoding algorithm is described and compared to the existing differential schemes.