GHz Channel Measurements Research Articles

Calibration of NYURay for Ray Tracing using 28, 73, and 142 GHz Channel Measurements conducted in Indoor, Outdoor, and Factory Scenarios

Calibration of NYURay for Ray Tracing using 28, 73, and 142 GHz Channel Measurements conducted in Indoor, Outdoor, and Factory Scenarios

Channel Measurement and Ray-Tracing Simulation for 77 GHz Automotive Radar

Millimeter-wave automotive radar is essential for realizing autonomous driving. Realistic channel model and simulation are important for system and sensing algorithm design. This work introduces channel measurements and ray-tracing (RT) channel simulations for frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) automotive mmWave radar. The 77 GHz channel measurements in an urban crossroads environment are presented. The dominant echoes (multi-path components) of the measurement are detected and matched with corresponding objects for each frame. A measurement-based electromagnetic (EM) parameter estimation method is proposed to find the optimal parameter set that minimizes the error of simulated radar cross section (RCS). As a result, the issue of lacking reliable EM material parameters for RT simulation at 77 GHz frequency band is tackled. Simulation results are validated in power, range, velocity, and angle domains with the provided EM parameter set. Extending validated RT simulations in similar environments with various configurations allows more reliable channels for rigorous testing without the limitation of channel measurement.

Non-stationary time-varying vehicular channel characteristics for different roadside scattering environments

With the deep integration of wireless communication technology and automobile industry, vehicular communication has become one of the key technologies supporting the development of Internet-of-vehicle. Due to the high-speed mobility of vehicles and the rapid change of the propagation environments, vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) wireless communication channels are generally non-stationary. Meanwhile, the variability of V2V channel characteristics is obvious in different scattering environments. Focusing on these research points, this paper presents the analysis and comparison of V2V channel characteristics for different scattering scenarios based on a series of 5.9 GHz channel measurements. The measurement data are collected from the iron bridge, the soundproof wall, and the road lamp scenarios. The stationary time and frequency are investigated on the basis of method of local scattering functions. The classical channel characteristics, including power delay profile, Ricean K-factor, root means square (RMS) delay spread and RMS Doppler spread are extracted following the propagation principle. Furthermore, considering the source and birth-death process of multi-path components (MPCs) in different scattering propagation environments, cluster identification and statistical results are presented and compared. The different values of the channel parameters and the different performance of the channel under different scattering environments can help us understand the V2V channel deeply. The research results can be used for the design and optimization of vehicular communication systems in different scattering environments.

Sub-6 GHz Channel Modeling and Evaluation in Indoor Industrial Environments

This paper presents sub-6 GHz channel measurements using a directional antenna at the transmitter and a directional or omnidirectional antenna at the receiver at 4.145 GHz in sparse and dense industrial environments for a line-of-sight scenario. Furthermore, the first measured over-the-air error vector magnitude (EVM) results depending on different 5G new radio modulation and coding schemes (MCSs of16 QAM, 64 QAM and 256 QAM) are provided. From the measurement campaigns, the path loss exponents (PLE) using a directional and an omnidirectional antenna at the receiver in the sparse and the dense environment are 1.24/1.39 and 1.35/1.5, respectively. PLE results are lower than the theoretical free space PLE of 2, indicating that indoor industrial environments have rich multipaths. The measured power delay profiles show the maximum root mean square (RMS) delay spreads of 11 ns with a directional antenna and 34 ns with an omnidirectional antenna at the receiver in a sparse industrial environment. However, in a dense industrial environment the maximum RMS delay spreads are significantly increased: maximum RMS delay spreads range from 226 to 282 ns for the omnidirectional and the directional antenna configuration. EVM measurements show that to increase coverage and enable higher MCS modes to be used for reliable data transmission, in both industrial environments using a directional antenna at the transmitter and the receiver is required. The large-scale path loss models, multipath time dispersion characteristics and EVM results provide insight into the deployments of 5G networks operating at sub-6 GHz frequency bands in different industrial environments.

Scalable Modeling of Human Blockage at Millimeter-Wave: A Comparative Analysis of Knife-Edge Diffraction, the Uniform Theory of Diffraction, and Physical Optics Against 60 GHz Channel Measurements

Scalable Modeling of Human Blockage at Millimeter-Wave: A Comparative Analysis of Knife-Edge Diffraction, the Uniform Theory of Diffraction, and Physical Optics Against 60 GHz Channel Measurements

An ANN‐based channel modeling in 5G millimeter wave for a high‐voltage substation

In this work, an artificial neural network (ANN) based time-varying channel modeling framework is proposed, including a playback model and a prediction model. The purpose of the ANN-based modeling framework is to playback 5G measured radio channels at certain measurement positions, and further predict large scale channel parameters (LSCPs) at unmeasured positions with limited amount of measurement data. 28 GHz channel measurements were also conducted at a high-voltage substation for the first time worldwide to meet with 5G radio system deployment for China Energy Internet. Meanwhile, the performance of the playback channels is evaluated by comparison with the measurements and traditional geometry based stochastic modeling (GBSM) simulated channels. An optimized radial basis function (ORBF) ANN is applied in the prediction model, and the predicted LSCPs are compared with the other approaches, which shows that the ORBF has the best performance. This work offers a solution to predict radio channels and parameters in case of big measured or simulated channel datasets.

EMR: A new metric to assess the resilience of directional mmWave channels to blockages

Millimeter-wave (mmWave) communication systems require narrow beams to compensate for high path loss and to increase the communication range. If an obstacle blocks the dominant communication direction, alternative paths (directions) should be quickly identified to maintain reliable connectivity. In this paper, we introduce a new metric to quantify the Effective Multipath Richness (EMR) of a directional communication channel in the angular domain. In particular, the proposed metric takes into account the strength and spatial diversity of the resolved Multipath Components (MPCs), while also considering the beamwidth of the communication link and the blockage characteristics. The metric is defined as a weighted sum of the number of distinct MPC clusters in the angular domain, where the clustering of the MPCs is performed based on the cosine-distance between the dominant MPCs.
 For a given transmitter (TX) and receiver (RX) pair, the EMR is a single scalar value that characterizes the robustness of the communication link against blockages, as it captures the number of unique communication directions that can be utilized. It is also possible to characterize the blockage robustness for the whole environment by evaluating the spatial distribution of the EMR metric considering various different TX/RX locations. Using our proposed metric, one can assess the scattering richness of different environments to achieve a particular service quality. We evaluate the proposed metric using our 28 GHz channel measurements in a library environment for Line-of-Sight (LOS) and NLOS scenarios, and compare it with some other commonly used propagation metrics. We argue that EMR is especially informative at higher frequencies, e.g., mmWave and terahertz (THz), where the propagation attenuation is high, and directional Non-Light-of-Sight (NLOS) communication is critical for the success of the network.

Non-Stationary Vehicular Channel Characterization in Complicated Scenarios

Wireless channel characterization and modeling is the foundation of vehicular communication systems. However, most of the existing researches on vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) channel are aimed at the traditional scenarios such as urban and suburban, and the researches on some complicated vehicular scenarios are insufficient. For example, little attention is paid to viaduct, tunnel, and cutting scenarios in vehicular communications, and these complex scenarios often become the high-incidence area of communication interruption, and then affect the overall performance of the vehicular communication system due to the bad and unique channel characteristics. In this paper, to fill this gap, time-varying characteristics of V2V channels in viaduct, tunnel, and cutting scenarios are investigated. Specifically, based on 5.9 GHz channel measurements, channel non-stationarity is quantitatively evaluated and compared. Further, a detailed analysis of time-varying power and delay of multipath components (MPCs) is presented. Based on the obtained results, the mechanism of physical environment affecting channel characteristics is analyzed, and the impacts of vehicular scenarios are quantified. Besides, the impacts of scenarios on the spatial distribution of MPCs are investigated. The angular distributions of MPCs in the three typical V2V scenarios are revealed, and the corresponding statistical characteristics are presented. Moreover, the characteristics of MPC clusters in different scenarios are further quantified and analyzed, such as MPC number in each cluster and cluster lifetime. It is revealed that the non-stationarity of the V2V channel originates from the birth-death process of MPC clusters, and the birth-death process is modeled statistically. The results in the paper show the V2V channel propagation mechanism and can be used for the design of vehicular communication systems in complicated scenarios.

Millimeter-wave channel simulation algorithm with consistency based on spatial recursion

Based on the Bird’s Nest 28 GHz channel measurement data, this paper proposes a spatially consistent channel large-scale parameter generation algorithm based on spatial recursion, and compares it with the traditional WINNER II algorithm. This algorithm uses multi-dimensional normal distribution and specific recursion algorithm and generates the channel large-scale parameters of each simulation point sequentially, to realize the auto-correlation and cross-correlation characteristics of the parameters. The results show that, on the premise of achieving spatial consistency, the simulation results of the spatial recursive parameter generation algorithm are highly consistent with the measured data, the simulation accuracy of this algorithm is better than the WINNER II algorithm. Compared with the WINNER II algorithm, the spatial recursive parameter generation algorithm does not need to generate the parameter cross-correlation characteristics separately, which simplifies the simulation steps. The spatial recursive parameter generation algorithm provides a way for the research of related algorithms. This new idea is of great significance for millimetre-wave time-varying channel simulation.

Frequency-Dependence Characterization of Electromagnetic Reverberation in Indoor Scenarios Based on 1–40 GHz Channel Measurements

A novel model for the reverberation time is proposed in this letter, based on room electromagnetics theory. While the commonly used models consider absorption based on a constant rate of wall interactions within a given time, the proposed model takes the variance of interactions into account. Moreover, the frequency dependence of electromagnetic reverberation characteristics in indoor environments is experimentally investigated from 1 to 40 GHz. The reverberation time is found to be a decreasing function of frequency. A model is then developed to predict the room's quality factor, reverberation time, and average absorption coefficient. Good agreement is obtained with the limited results reported in the literature for similar scenarios. This approach aims to be an accurate alternative to the reverberation time measurements and computations in indoor environments by linking it to the theory of electromagnetic fields in cavities.

Wireless channel parameter estimation algorithms: Recent advances and future challenges

Temporal and three-dimensional (3D) spatial information is important for the characterization of wireless channels. In this paper, the commonly used array signal processing (ASP) methods to estimate channel parameters are summarized. Firstly, algorithms that can be used to estimate azimuth angle of arrival (AAoA) and elevation AoA (EAoA) are introduced. They include multiple signal classification (MUSIC), estimation of signal parameter via rotational invariance techniques (ESPRIT), and Unitary ESPRIT algorithms. Secondly, algorithms that can be used to jointly estimate delay, AAoA, and EAoA are given. They include joint angle and delay estimation (JADE) MUSIC, JADE ESPRIT, shift-invariance (SI) JADE, and space-alternating generalized expectation-maximization (SAGE) algorithms. We also propose an improved SI-JADE algorithm to further reduce computation complexity by incorporating with the Unitary ESPRIT algorithm. Performance of the above algorithms to extract only spatial information and to jointly extract temporal and spatial information is compared in both synthetic and 60 GHz real channel environments. Simulation results show that with the inclusion of delay estimation, the joint temporal and spatial estimation algorithms can provide better resolution than algorithms estimating only angles. Measurement data processing results show that MUSIC algorithm can provide comparable results with SAGE algorithm in estimating AAoA and EAoA. SI-JADE and the improved SI-JADE algorithms are also applicable to process 60 GHz channel measurement data. However, MUSIC, SI-JADE, and the improved SI-JADE algorithms can greatly reduce computational burden compared with SAGE algorithm. At last, some future directions are pointed out.

Maximising the utility of enterprise millimetre-wave networks

Millimetre-wave (mmWave) technology is a promising candidate for meeting the intensifying demand for ultra fast wireless connectivity, especially in high-end enterprise networks. Very narrow beam forming is mandatory to mitigate the severe attenuation specific to the extremely high frequency (EHF) bands exploited. Simultaneously, this greatly reduces interference, but generates problematic communication blockages. As a consequence, client association control and scheduling in scenarios with densely deployed mmWave access points become particularly challenging, while policies designed for traditional wireless networks remain inappropriate. In this paper we formulate and solve these tasks as utility maximisation problems under different traffic regimes, for the first time in the mmWave context. We specify a set of low-complexity algorithms that capture distinctive terminal deafness and user demand constraints, while providing near-optimal client associations and airtime allocations, despite the problems’ inherent NP-completeness. To evaluate our solutions, we develop an NS-3 implementation of the IEEE 802.11ad protocol, which we construct upon preliminary 60GHz channel measurements. Simulation results demonstrate that our schemes provide up to 60% higher throughput as compared to the commonly used signal strength based association policy for mmWave networks, and outperform recently proposed load-balancing oriented solutions, as we accommodate the demand of 33% more clients in both static and mobile scenarios.

Wideband Spectrum Adaptation Without Coordination

Fixed channelization configuration in today's wireless devices falls inefficient in the presence of growing data traffic and heterogeneous devices. In this regard, a number of fairly recent studies have provided spectrum adaptation capabilities for current wireless devices, however, they are limited to inband adaptation or incur substantial coordination overhead. The target of this paper is to fill the gaps in spectrum adaptation by overcoming these limitations. We propose Seer , a frame-level wideband spectrum adaptation solution which consists of two major components: i) a specially-constructed preamble that can be detected by receivers with arbitrary RF bands, and ii) a spectrum detection algorithm that identifies the desired transmission band in the context of multiple asynchronous senders by exploiting the preamble's temporal and spectral properties. Seer can be realized on commodity radios, and can be easily integrated into devices running different PHY/MAC protocols. We have prototyped Seer on the GNURadio/USRP platform to demonstrate its feasibility. Furthermore, using 1.6GHz channel measurements and trace-driven simulations, we have evaluated the merits of Seer over state-of-the-art approaches.

SLM localised SC‐FDMA performance evaluation based on 30 GHz channel measurement for 5G

A performance evaluation of selective mapping localised single carrier frequency division multiple access technique (SLM LSC-FDMA) is presented over channel measured at 30 GHz. These measurements were taken between three buildings under non-line-of-sight (NLOS) for a propagation path length of 183 m. Simulation results present a peak-to-average power ratio gain of 3.78 dB for the proposed scheme over localised orthogonal frequency division multiple access system and an acceptable bit error rate with and without high power amplifier compared with LSC-FDMA. These results show an improvement of the transmission efficiency under NLOS outdoor scenario at 30 GHz. Hence, these results suggest the use of SLM LSC-FDMA wave form for fifth generation mobile communication at 30 GHz.

A Physically Based Soil Moisture and Microwave Emissivity Data Set for Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Applications

The joint National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission will provide considerably more observations over complex and dynamically changing land backgrounds. A physically based precipitation retrieval using GPM's satellite constellation of passive microwave (PMW) observations has to accommodate the spatially and temporally varying radiometric signature of the land surface to constrain the set of candidate rainfall solutions. The challenge for retrieval algorithms is to identify and isolate precipitation profiles whose simulated observations agree with the satellite observations and are also representative of the surface conditions. Microwave emissivity modeling results are presented from a physically based land algorithm that retrieves soil moisture, vegetation water content, and surface temperature, along with the emissivity using polarized 10, 18, and 37 GHz channel measurements from the WindSat sensor onboard the Coriolis satellite, and results from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Microwave Imager (TMI). The emissivity mean, coefficient of variation, covariance, and correlation slope are examined for the range of clear-scene surface properties observed by WindSat and TRMM between 2003-2012 and 2002-2011, respectively, under a range of seasons, time of day, rain events, etc. These joint data provide a means to examine the extent to which the surface geophysical properties control the microwave land surface emissivity covariability, to better utilize these lower frequency observations in overland PMW-based precipitation retrievals.

On mm-Wave Multipath Clustering and Channel Modeling

Efficient and realistic mm-wave channel models are of vital importance for the development of novel mm-wave wireless technologies. Though many of the current 60 GHz channel models are based on the useful concept of multipath clusters, only a limited number of 60 GHz channel measurements have been reported in the literature for this purpose. Therefore, there is still a need for further measurement based analyses of multipath clustering in the 60 GHz band. This paper presents clustering results for a double-directional 60 GHz MIMO channel model. Based on these results, we derive a model which is validated with measured data. Statistical cluster parameters are evaluated and compared with existing channel models. It is shown that the cluster angular characteristics are closely related to the room geometry and environment, making it infeasible to model the delay and angular domains independently. We also show that when using ray tracing to model the channel, it is insufficient to only consider walls, ceiling, floor and tables; finer structures such as ceiling lamps, chairs and bookshelves need to be taken into account as well.

Polarimetric Characterization of Ultrawideband Propagation Channels

The polarization characteristics of the indoor ultrawideband channel are investigated using dual-polar 3.1-10.6 GHz channel measurements. Under the generalized elliptical polarization framework, the channel cross-polar discrimination (XPD) statistics are evaluated. Lognormal and triangular distributions are shown to well model the XPD and ellipticity angle. Considerable spectral and small-scale spatial variability is observed in the XPD. Asymptotic convergence of XPD to its mean with increasing bandwidth is established. An analysis of the variation of tap XPD with excess delay indicates that the XPD is highest for the initial paths. It is shown that increased scattering leads to greater depolarization. The dependence of XPD on the channel's rms delay spread is modelled using a linear regression with -0.5 dB/ns slope. This characterization will aid the analysis of polarization-dependent loss and the design of polarized multiple-antenna systems.