Spatial Modulation for Improved Performance of Next-Generation WLAN

Abstract

Next-generation wireless networks target dense deployment scenarios where many heterogeneous devices, from high-end laptops to low-power Internet of Things (IoT) devices and wearables, must coexist and operate reliably. With increased deployment of IoT devices and wearables, increasing the energy efficiency without increasing complexity#x002F;cost is highly desirable in future dense wireless networks. In current wireless local area networks (WLAN), implementing multi-input multi-output (MIMO) techniques which utilizes multiple RF chains has become the norm, however, for IoT and wearable-type devices this is not efficient due to size and cost constraints. This paper studies the application of the Spatial Modulation (SM) waveform to the WLAN system (commercially named Wi-Fi). Specifically, the SM concept is applied to the MIMO orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transceiver architecture of the 802.11 WLAN standards calling it spatially-modulated OFDM (SM-OFDM) WLAN. Thus, using a small number of RF chains, and ideally a single RF chain, is highly desirable for future low-cost devices. The proposed SM-OFDM scheme helps the Access Point (AP) to efficiently communicate with this diverse set of devices while addressing challenging design trade-offs between energy efficiency, implementation complexity, and overall network spectral efficiency.