On Simple-Sectored Multi-Probe Anechoic Chamber Design for mmWave Adaptive Terminal

Xiaoli Yang,Nan Ma,Jianqiao Chen,Wei Fan,Ping Zhang

doi:10.1109/access.2020.2971338

Abstract

Over-the-air (OTA) testing of millimeter-wave (mmWave) adaptive terminal is expected to be an essential step in the product design and development stage. In this paper, we investigated the simple-sectored multi-probe anechoic chamber (SS-MPAC) configuration for testing mmWave adaptive terminal under fading channel conditions. By summarizing the characteristics of the adaptive terminal antenna, four representative antenna sub-arrays were utilized to evaluate the testing performance under two spatial channel models. We also discussed two evaluation metrics to assess the accuracy of the SS-MPAC configuration. The results indicated that, the configuration parameters of SS-MPAC design were determined mainly by the position of the adaptive antenna sub-arrays and the half power beamwidth (HPBW) of adaptive antenna systems. Furthermore, to ensure accurate emulation of spatial correlation between multiple active sub-arrays on the terminal, a much more expensive setup configuration is expected, compared to single active sub-array (single adaptive array, or multiple sub-arrays with switch structure) terminal case. These findings are valuable inputs for the ongoing New Radio (NR) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) OTA work in the standardization.

Highlights

Owing to the rapid growth in wireless data traffic, many new technologies will be developed to enhance fifth-generation (5G) network performance [1]
It is generally accepted that the signal-tointerference-plus noise ratio (SINR) reduces considerably owing to high transmission loss and attenuation due to blockage at mmWave bands [3]
The radiated two-stage (RTS) method has been approved as an alternative Long Term Evolution (LTE) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) OTA test method to multi-probe anechoic chamber (MPAC) in the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) [9]

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Owing to the rapid growth in wireless data traffic, many new technologies will be developed to enhance fifth-generation (5G) network performance [1]. The RTS method has been approved as an alternative Long Term Evolution (LTE) MIMO OTA test method to MPAC in the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) [9] This method can be useful for static mmWave antenna testing [10], but it will not work for testing under dynamic channel conditions where the DUT antenna pattern is expected to change during the test, since it is not a true endto-end testing method. Knowledge of DUT antenna systems might be available in development and research stage, via simulation, measurement or specifications To address this problem, In this paper, we evaluate the system design for SS-MPAC using the black box and white box approach. It is calculated based on the pre-faded signal synthesis (PFS) technique [15], where the objective is to optimize the power weights for probe antennas to reconstruct the target spatial channel model

OTA METRICS

SIMULATION RESULTS

CONCLUSION