WOLLO UNIVERSITY

KOMBOLCHA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL & COMPUTER ENGINEERING

COMMUNICATION STREAM

TITLE:- PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF STBC ON MIMO SYSTEM

ADVISORS NAME: Mr. DEREJE G. AND

Mr. TEDROS S.

GROUP MEMBERS

NAME ID NO

ABDUSELAM CHANE………………………….0759/05

AKMEL YASSIN…………………………1242/04

SHEMSE WUCHAGO……………………1003/05

HENOK BOGALE…………………………0607/05

MUHSINA TEMAM………………………...1259/ 05

SUBMISSION DATE 16/10/2009 E.C

 DECLARATION

We declare that this thesis is our original work. To the best of our knowledge, the work
presented here has not been presented for a degree in any other Institution of Higher Learning.

i|Page
 ACKNOWLEDGMENT

First of all, we would like to thank Allah (God ) for his blessing for His guidance in Our Life. Next
we would like to very grateful thank for our advisors, Mr.Dereja G. and Mr.Tedros S. for their
supports and pointed guidance given all along our final year project.They had giving us advice and
consultation in completing the project.We would also acknowledge the Wollo University,
kombolcha institute of Technology (Kiot), School of Electrical and Computer Engineering for
allowing us to do this thesis. Finally, we would like to thank everybody who was important to the
successful realization of our Thesis.
we would like thank to KIOT lab technician who support us during our project design and our
friends who have selflessly shared the opinions and useful information as well as the technical
supports to us in order to complete the project.

ii | P a g e
Contents
DECLARATION ................................................................................................................................................ i
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ..................................................................................................................................... ii
Table of figure ............................................................................................................................................... v
List table ....................................................................................................................................................... vi
CHAPTER ONE ............................................................................................................................................... 1
1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................. 1
1.1. Problem of Statement ............................................................................................................... 2
1.2. Motivation................................................................................................................................. 2
1.3 Objectives of the thesis ................................................................................................................... 2
1.3.1. General Objective ....................................................................................................................... 2
1.3.2. Specific Objective ........................................................................................................................ 2
. 1.4 Organization of the Thesis ......................................................................................................... 3
1.5 Modulation Technique .................................................................................................................... 3
CHAPTER TWO .............................................................................................................................................. 5
2. LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................................................. 5
2.1 RELATED WORK ............................................................................................................................... 5
2.2 MIMO CHANNEL FOR WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS .................................................................... 6
2.3 PROPAGATION CHARACTERISTICS IN WIRELESS CHANNEL ............................................................ 7
2.4 SMALL –SCALE FADING ................................................................................................................... 7
2.4.1 Types of small - Scale Fading ...................................................................................................... 8
2.5 DIVERSITY IN WIRELESS CHANNELS ................................................................................................ 9
2.5.1. TIME DIVERSITY ........................................................................................................................... 9
2.5.2. FREQUENCY DIVERSITY ............................................................................................................... 9
2.5.3. ANTENNA DIVERSITY .................................................................................................................. 9
CHAPTER THREE .......................................................................................................................................... 11
3.METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................................................... 11
3.1 MIMO ............................................................................................................................................ 11
3.2. Comparison Between SISO, SIMO, MISO and MIMO Systems.................................................... 12
3.2.1. Single Input Single Output (SISO) ............................................................................................. 12
3.3.2. Single Input Multiple Outputs (SIMO)....................................................................................... 12
3.3.3 Multiple Input Single Output (MISO) ......................................................................................... 13
3.3.4. Multiple Input and Multiple Outputs (MIMO) ......................................................................... 13

iii | P a g e
 3.5. Space Time Block Coding............................................................................................................. 14
3.6 Alamouti Code Scheme ................................................................................................................. 15
3.7 Receiver Diversity.......................................................................................................................... 18
CHAPTER FOUR ........................................................................................................................................... 21
4. DISCUSSION AND RESULTS.................................................................................................................. 21
CHAPTER FIVE ............................................................................................................................................. 25
5. CONCLUSION AND FURTHER WORK ................................................................................................... 25
5.1 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................. 25
5.2 Further Works ............................................................................................................................... 26
REFERENCE .................................................................................................................................................. 27
APPENDIX A ................................................................................................................................................. 28

iv | P a g e
 Table of figure

Figure 2-1 Five basic elements of communication systems. ......................................................................... 6

Figure 2--2 multi-path propagation ............................................................................................................... 7
Figure 3-1Flow chart ................................................................................................................................... 11
Figure 3-2 Single Input Single output (SISO) 1x1. .................................................................................... 12
Figure 3-3 Single Input Multiple Output (SIMO) 1x2 ................................................................................ 13
Figure 3-4 Multiple Input Single Output (MISO) 2x1. ............................................................................... 13
Figure 3-5 Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) 2x2 ........................................................................... 14
Figure 3-6 Alamouti scheme with two transmit and one receive antenna. .................................................. 16
Figure 3-7 Alamouti space-time encoder .................................................................................................... 18
Figure 3-8Alamouti space-time decoder ..................................................................................................... 18
Figure 3-9 Receiver diversity with two Receiver antenna ......................................................................... 19
Figure 4-1 Bit error rate performance comparison between Alamouti scheme, Receiver diversity and SISO
22

v|Page
 List table

Table 3-1 shows space –Time coding ......................................................................................................... 16

Table 4-1 Performance at BER of 10 − 3 ................................................................................................... 23
Table 4-2 Performance at BER of 10 − 4 ................................................................................................... 24

vi | P a g e
 ACRONYMS

AWGN Additive White Gaussian Noise

BER Bit Error Rate

BPSK Binary Phase Shift Keying

CSI Channel State Information

MIMO Multiple Input Multiple Output

ML Maximum likelihood

MRC Maximal Ratio Receiver Combining

MISO Multiple Input Single Output

LOS Line of Sight

Rx Receiver

SNR Signal to Noise Ratio

SISO Single Input Single Output

STBC Space Time Block Code

STC Space-Time Coding

SIMO Single Input Multiple Output

Tx Transmitter

vii | P a g e
 ABSTRACT

Wireless designers constantly seek to improve the spectrum efficiency/capacity, coverage of

wireless networks and link reliability. Space-time wireless technology that uses multiple antennas
along with appropriate signaling and receiver techniques offers a powerful tool for improving
wireless performance. More advanced MIMO techniques are planned for future mobile networks
Multiple antennas when used with appropriate Space-Time Coding (STC) techniques can achieve
huge performance gains in multipath fading wireless links. The Space Time Coding has evolved
as a most vibrant research area in wireless communications.

Recently, Space-Time Block Coding (STBC) has been trying to incorporate in the forthcoming
generation of mobile communication standard which aims to deliver true multimedia capability.
This paper presents the Space-Time Block Codes (STBC) for wireless networks that uses multiple
numbers of antennas at both transmitter and receiver. The simulations have been done in
MATLAB. The STBC which includes the Alamouti Scheme as well as STBC for 2 transmit
antenna case has been simulated and studied. Our simulation show that the system with two
transmit and two receive antenna (TxRx 2x2) has low BER than system with MISO (TxRx
2x1),SIMO (TxRx 1x2) and SISO (TxRx 1x1).

viii | P a g e
 CHAPTER ONE

1. INTRODUCTION
MIMO stands for multiple-input multiple-output and means multiple antennas at both link ends of
a communication system, i.e., at the transmit and at the receive side. The multiple-antennas at the
transmitter and/or at the receiver in a wireless communication link open a new dimension in
reliable communication, which can improve the system performance substantially. The idea behind
MIMO is that the transmit antennas at one end and the receive antennas at the other end are”
connected and combined “in such a way that the quality (the bit error rate (BER), or the data rate)
for each user is improved.

In MIMO technology improves the performance of system through multiplexing and diversity,
achieved high data rates and antenna as compared to single antenna. The system uses multiple
antenna at input (transmitter) side and the same as at output (receiver) side is commonly referred
as MIMO systems.

The core idea in MIMO transmission is space-time signal processing in which signal processing
in time is complemented by signal processing in the spatial dimension by using multiple,spatially
distributed antennas at both link ends. One essential problem of the wireless channel is fading,
which occurs as the signal follows multiple paths between the transmit and the receive antennas.
Under certain, not uncommon conditions, the arriving signals will add up destructively, reducing
the received power. In this case no reliable communication is possible. Fading can be mitigated by
diversity, which means that the information is transmitted not only once but several times, hoping
that at least one of the replicas will not undergo severe fading. Diversity makes use of an important
property of wireless MIMO channels: different signal paths can be often modeled as a number of
separate, independent fading channels. These channels can be distinct in frequency domain or in
time domain.

Several transmission schemes have been proposed that utilize the MIMO channel in different ways
e.g. Space-time coding. Space-time coding is a promising method where the number of the
transmitted code symbols per time slot are equal to the number of transmit antennas. These code
symbols are generated by the space-time.

1|Page
 1.1. Problem of Statement
The problems which are associated with the wireless communications is fading and interference.
When the signal is propagated from transmitter to receiver the signal power drops due to path loss
and fading. To overcome fading issues diversity techniques are used. MIMO exploits multipath
takes advantage of the spatial diversity obtained by spatially separated antennas in a dense
multipath scattering environment. Question that comes to mind is ‘How can be BER improved?
A hypothesis was put forward and this can be done by using multiple antenna technology with
Alamouti scheme (Space time block code). The combination of Alamouti scheme with MIMO
maximizes the diversity gain and this in return gives improvement in BER when the number of
antennas are increased.

There are different proposed techniques that are used to improve the BER. In this thesis we will
discuss the Alamouti (Space time block code) for MIMO-An Evolution to 4G improving BER.
Alamouti space time block code is used for multiple antenna technology. The code works
orthogonally and doesn’t work if the number of transmitting antennas increases from two.
diversity gain achieved through space-time coding (STC) can be used either to improve the
connection quality or to increase modulation gradation.

1.2. Motivation
MIMO antenna systems are very important to increase capacity and bit error rate of wireless
communication depending on the mode of transmission method such as spatial diversity. In
addition to higher bit rates and smaller error rates, MIMO techniques can also be utilized to
improve the signal to noise ratio (SNR) at the receiver and to suppress co-channel interference in
a multiuser scenario.

1.3 Objectives of the thesis

1.3.1. General Objective
 To Increase the Reliability of Communication System

1.3.2. Specific Objective

 To evaluate different MIMO techniques
 To evaluate space time block code for MIMO wireless communication.
 To analyze performance of different MIMO system

2|Page
  To evaluate and analyze BER performance of space time block coding for
MIMO systems

. 1.4 Organization of the Thesis

Chapter 1, Introduction, Back ground, objectives of the thesis, Significance of the thesis, Scope
of the study, Statement of the Problem. In Chapter 2, Literature Review or Related work about
space time block coding and presents information on the evolution and present state of theory,
practice and research of wireless communication

Chapter 3, Methodology

Chapter 4: Simulation Result and discussion

This chapter, the results obtained are explained and discussed. The modifications that were
carried out are also explained in this section

Chapter 5: Conclusion and Future Work

This chapter gives the conclusion and Future Work after completion of the final year project. It
covers assessment of whether project objectives and scope were achieved.

1.5 Modulation Technique

We have different kind of modulation scheme .It is chosen according to channel characteristics
in order to optimize channels‟ performance.

 Amplitude Modulation

Amplitude modulation is the change in amplitude of the carrier signal in accordance with

information bearing signal.

 Frequency Modulation

Frequency modulation is the change in frequency of carrier signal in accordance with

information bearing signal. But the amplitude of carrier remains constant.

 Phase Modulation

It is similarly to frequency modulation but instead of frequency the phase of the carrier

3|Page
signal change in accordance with information bearing signal.

 Binary Phase Shift Keying

The two signals with different phase (it is normally 0,π) represent the binary data

4|Page
 CHAPTER TWO

2. LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 RELATED WORK
Alamouti's scheme was originally designed for flat (frequency non-selective) fading channels, but
the condition for frequency selectivity is not defined exactly. Martin Svirak, presented to
Simulation of Space-Time Block Coding in Broadband Indoor Fading Channel Using Matlab,
presents a large effect of frequency selectivity on the space time communication system. but the
main drawback of this method is that it is used inside buildings did not provide outdoor free space
channels.

Another study also presented by Shreedhar A Joshi et al.where he studied Space Time Block
Coding for MIMO Systems using Alamouti Method With Digital Modulation Techniques BPSK
and QAM Modulation Scheme with channel state information (CSI) at the transmitter, but they
used a large SNR to achieve this. Sachin Chourasia, prabhat Pate presented A Comparative
analysis of space time block code with trellis coded modulation over Rayleigh and Rician fading
channel. The BER performance of Rician channel (LOS) is better than Rayleigh channel when
the line of sight (LOS) path is considered, While with no line of sight (NLOS) path is considered,
this technique gives better result of about 1dB over Rayleigh fading channel as compare to the
Rician fading channel. but still the problem of high SNR Exist. Jafarkhani, proposed STBC
schemes with reducing orthogonality but increasing its complexity. In Tirkkonen, STBCs were
improved by using constellation rotation in order to achieve full diversity.
In Sezginer and Sari a family of full-rate, full-diversity 2 × 2 space-time coding (STC), and whose
detection complexity grows only quadratically with the size of the signal constellation have been
proposed Kim and Cheun different approach to achieve low-complexity near-maximum likelihood
(ML).

STBC decoding based on iterative interference cancellation was proposed.

Yuen et al, aiming to reduce the overall decoding complexity, minimum decoding complexity
(MDC) ,STBC structures were proposed requiring the joint detection of two-real symbols
regardless of the number of transmitting antennas.

5|Page
This thesis, unlike others does not focus on performance of Multiple-Input Multiple-Output
(MIMO) alone but also on other forms of multiple-antenna configurations such as Multiple Input
Single-Output (MISO), and Single-Input Multiple-Output (SIMO) with different diversity
techniques. This form of diversity is applicable at the physical layer. Single-Input Single-Output
(SISO) which is the traditional method of transmission using sectoral antennas is also considered.

2.2 MIMO CHANNEL FOR WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS

Multiple input multiple output (MIMO) systems are a natural extension of
developments in antenna array communication Fading makes it extremely difficult for the receiver
to recover the transmitted signal unless the receiver is provided with some form of diversity. The
communication process consists of five basic elements, namely, source information,

transmitter, channel, receiver and user information as shown in Fig 1.1 below.

Figure 2-0-1 Five basic elements of communication systems.

 The source information: generates a signal that carries the message. The message may

be various types, either analog form such as audio signal or digital form like bit stream

from computer. The message signal from source is usually in the form of baseband signal.

 Transmitter: it operates in some way on message signal and produces a signal suitable

for transmission to receiving point over the specific channel. The transmitted signal always much
higher the maximum frequency component of the message signals.

 Channel: It is a media used to transmit the signal from transmitting to receiving point.

During transmission noise and different kind of interfering signals added to transmitting

signal.

 Receiver: It operates on receive signal and trying to reproduce original signal from it

6|Page
since the received signal is corrupted version of transmitted signal

 User of information(destination): It is a person or thing for which the message is

intended.

2.3 PROPAGATION CHARACTERISTICS IN WIRELESS CHANNEL

Wireless channel experience a lot of limitation on the performance of wireless system. It is
extremely random and difficult to analyses since the signal transmitted over wireless channel
arrives at the destination in a number of different path or multi-path. The multi-path arises from
scattering, reflection, diffraction or refraction of radiated energy of that objects lie in the
environment. The actually received signal is often weaker than transmitted signal due to
propagation loss and fading.

Figure 2-0-2 multi-path propagation

2.4 SMALL –SCALE FADING

Fading is rapid change in amplitude, phases or multi-path delays of transmitted radio signal over
short period of time or travel distance. It is caused by interference of one or more signal which
arrives at receiver with slightly different times.

7|Page
 2.4.1 Types of small - Scale Fading
We classify small-scale fading in two broad parts depending on the relation between the signal
parameters (such us bandwidth and symbol period) and the channel parameters (such us rms delay
spread and Doppler spread).

 Based on multi-path time Delay spread

1) Flat fading

When the transmitted signal bandwidth much lesser than the coherence bandwidth, the wireless
channel is called flat fading. If the channel has a constant gain and linear phase response over a
bandwidth of the transmitted signal, then the received signal will undergo flat fading. In flat fading,
the multi-path structure of the channel is such that the spectral characteristics of the transmitted
signal are preserved at the receiver. However, the strength of the received signal changes with
time, due to fluctuations in the gain of the channel caused by multi-path.

2) Frequency selective fading

When the channel bandwidth is smaller than transmitted signal then the channel creates frequency
selective fading on received signal. Frequency selective fading occurs when multi-path delay
greater than the symbol period of the transmitted symbol.

 Based on Doppler spread

1)Fast fading

It is a kind of fading that the multi-path waves components such us amplitude, phases, time delay
change faster than the rate of change of the transmitted signal.

2) Slow fading

Slow fading results from a blocking effect due to buildings and natural features and is also known
as long-term fading, or shadowing. The statistical distribution of the mean is influenced by the
antenna heights, operating frequency and specific type of environment.

8|Page
 2.5 DIVERSITY IN WIRELESS CHANNELS
In wireless communication we encounter multi-path fading which is fluctuate in signal strength
throughout the channel. This problem gives raise to high data Bit error rates. To solve this problem
we can use diversity technique. It is achieved by providing a copy of transmitted signal over
frequency, time and space. We have the different kind of diversity technique in wireless
communication. Some of them are listed below

2.5.1. TIME DIVERSITY

Transmitting the replica of signal at the same moment of time and it arrives at receiver different
moment in time if they travel different physical paths of different lengths. To get effective diversity
the channel should provide sufficient variation on time. we have to sure that the interleaved symbol
independent of the previous symbol at time of transmission to get good result.

2.5.2. FREQUENCY DIVERSITY

The technique is similarly to time diversity. However, here provides diversity of the replica of the
original signal in frequency domain. This method is to be practicable the coherent bandwidth of
the channel should be less than the signal bandwidth. It assures signal at different frequencies will
suffer independent level of attenuation or fading.

2.5.3. ANTENNA DIVERSITY

The replicas of the original signal from transmitter is provided across different antenna of the
receiver. Here also to insure independent fades across different antennas, the spacing of antennas
should be greater than the coherent distance. We can further divide the space diversity into receiver
and transmitter diversity which is depend on whether the diversity is applied to transmitter or to
receiver.

 Receiver Diversity

We use multiple antennas at receiver to improve the signal quality. It is costly and difficult to
implement in hand held mobile devices like cell phone. A good example for this is MRRC
(maximum Ratio combining) diversity.

 Transmitter Diversity

This method uses multiple antennas at transmiter to improve the signal quality. Today it is more
popular than receiver diversity since it so easier to implement at the base station. This scheme

9|Page
needs complete channel knowledge at the transmitter. However, the new simple transmit diversity
technique like Alamouti scheme they do not need channel information.

10 | P a g e
 CHAPTER THREE

3.METHODOLOGY

Figure 3-0-1Flow chart

3.1 MIMO
MIMO stand for multiple inputs and multiple outputs. It is a system that uses several antennas at
the transmitter and receiver links. Because of the invention of new technology like, portable
terminal (laptop), mobile terminal (cell phones) and consumer devices, demand on bandwidth
constantly increasing and frequency spectrum is too crowded. Moreover, we faced challenge with
both an operator and a subscriber side. The operator needs high coverage and high capacity

11 | P a g e
whereas subscriber needs high quality and high speed. During design Engineers face uphill
challenge to increase capacity, reliability, and speed and spectrum efficiency in order to meet both
the subscriber and the operator interest.

Before introduction of MIMO there was a popular technology called smart antenna is used to
improving wireless communication in adverse propagation conditions such as fading, multi-path
and interference. The main idea in smart antennas is that of beamforming by which one increase
the average signal noise ratio (SNR) through focusing into desire direction. This can be achieved
by optimally combining the element with weight selected as function of each element response.
And also using spatially diversity, which is use antenna array, the probability of losing the signals
altogether are decrease exponential with the number of décor related antenna elements.

But the use of MIMO link goes beyond that of smart antennas. It transmits different signals from
each transmits element so that the receiving antennas received the superposition of all transmitted
signals. Multiple antenna both transmitter and receiver creates a matrix of possible transmission
modes. The main advantage is depending on the possibility of transmitting over several spatial
modes of the matrix with in the same time-frequency slot without extra power waste.

3.2. Comparison Between SISO, SIMO, MISO and MIMO Systems

3.2.1. Single Input Single Output (SISO)
It is a traditional model in wireless system which uses one antenna at transmitter and one antenna
at receiver. Its overall performance largely dependent on channel behavior and environment. It is
used in radio and TV broadcast and our personal wireless technologies such us Wi-Fi and
Bluetooth. To improve the channel performance, we can use either single input multiple output
(SIMO) or multiple input single output (MISO).

Figure 3-0-2 Single Input Single output (SISO) 1x1.

3.3.2. Single Input Multiple Outputs (SIMO)

It uses one antenna at transmitter and multiple antennas at receiver. It is logical to use SIMO for
uplink scenarios. The receiver can either choose the best antenna to receive the stronger signal

12 | P a g e
(selection diversity) or combine signals from all antennas in order to increase SNR (Maximal Ratio
Receiver Combining or MRRC)

Figure 3-0-3 Single Input Multiple Output (SIMO) 1x2

3.3.3 Multiple Input Single Output (MISO)

We use several antenna at transmitter side whereas single antenna at receiver side. It is

more usually to use MISO for downlink scenarios

Figure 3-0-4 Multiple Input Single Output (MISO) 2x1.

3.3.4. Multiple Input and Multiple Outputs (MIMO)

We use multiple antenna both transmitter and receiver side. It is very hot topic today in wireless
technology such us PAN, LAN, MAN and WAN to increase data rate multiple times to satisfy the
bandwidth demand of broadband users

13 | P a g e
 Figure 3-0-5 Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) 2x2
MIMO systems can be defined as: Given an arbitrary wireless communication system, we consider
a link in which the transmitting ends as well as the receiving end is equipped with multiple antenna
elements as illustrated in Figure 3.4. The idea behind MIMO is that the signals on the transmit
(TX) antennas at one end and the receive (RX) antennas at the other end are “combined” in such
a way that the quality (bit-error rate or BER) or the data rate (bits/sec) of the communication for
each MIMO user will be improved. Such an advantage can be used to increase both the network’s
quality of service and the operator’s revenues significantly.A core idea in MIMO systems are
space–time signal processing in which time (the natural dimension of digital communication data)
is complemented with the spatial dimension inherent in the use of multiple spatially distributed
antennas. As such MIMO systems can be viewed as an extension of the so-called smart antennas,
a popular technology using antenna arrays for improving wireless transmission dating back several
decades. It is important to note that each antenna element on a MIMO system operates on the same
frequency and therefore does not require extra bandwidth. Also, for fair comparison, the total
power through all antenna elements is less than or equal to that of a single antenna system.

3.5. Space Time Block Coding.

STBC is one of the techniques which is used for transmission of multiple copies of information
to antennas to improve the reliability of system, thus providing high data rates & increasing the
capacity of the system.

Today wireless system supposed to have better quality, high bit rate, large coverage, be more
power and bandwidth efficient over time varying multi-path fading channel. But it is difficult to
achieve this in time varying multi-path fading environment. Space-Time Codes (STCs) have been

14 | P a g e
implemented in cellular communications as well as in wireless local area networks. Space time
coding is performed in both spatial and temporal domain introducing redundancy between signals
transmitted from various antennas at various time periods. It can achieve transmit diversity and
antenna gain over spatially uncorded systems without sacrificing bandwidth. The research on STC
focuses on improving the system performance by employing extra transmit antennas. In general,
the design of STC amounts to finding transmit matrices that satisfy certain optimality criteria
Constructing STC, researcher have to trade-off between three goals: simple decoding, minimizing
the error probability, and maximizing the information rate. The essential question is: How can we
maximize the transmitted date rate using a simple coding and decoding algorithm at the same time
as the bit error probability is minimized Space-time block codes (STBC)are a generalized version
of Alamouti scheme but have the same key features. These codes are orthogonal and can achieve
full transmit diversity specified by the number of transmit antennas. In other words, space-time
block codes are a complex version of Altamonte’s space-time code, where the encoding and
decoding schemes are the same as there in the Alamouti space-time code on both the transmitter
and receiver sides. The data are constructed as a matrix which has its columns equal to the number
of the transmit antennas and its rows equal to the number of the time slots required to transmit the
data. At the receiver side, the signals received are first combined and then sent to the maximum
likelihood detector where the decision rules are applied. There are different technique is proposed
to mitigate multi-path fading in a wireless channel.

3.6 Alamouti Code Scheme

Alamouti scheme is the basis of the Space Time Coding technique. The mathematical explanation
of the scheme with two transmitting and one receiving antennas is also explained here. In this
work, a two-branch transmit diversity scheme is implemented. Using two transmit antennas and
one receive antenna, the scheme provides the same diversity order as Receiver diversity with one
transmit antenna and two receive antennas. The scheme may easily be generalized to two transmit
antennas and M receive antennas to provide a diversity order of 2M. We will first see, two transmit
antenna and one receive scheme then two transmit and two receive scheme. Two transmitter and
one receiver scheme. Two symbols are considered at a time, say X 1and x2 they are transmitted in
two consecutive time slots. In first time slot, x1 is transmitted from antenna one and x2 is
transmitted from antenna two. In the second time slot- x2* is transmitted from antenna one while

15 | P a g e
and x1* is transmitted from antenna two as shown in Fig below. Also the equivalent space time
block coding matrix shown in table 3.1

Figure 3-0-6 Alamouti scheme with two transmit and one receive antenna.

Table 0-1 shows space –Time coding

𝑥1 𝑥2
Calamouti=[−𝑥 ∗ ]
2 𝑥1 ∗ Time Antenna 1 Antenna 2

T X1 X2

t+T −𝑥2 ∗ 𝑥1 ∗

16 | P a g e
The fading coefficient from antenna one and two are denoted by h1(t) and h2(t) respectively at
time t. By assuming these coefficients are constant across two consecutive symbols

h1=h1(t+T)=h1=β1𝑒 ϳ𝛼1

h2(t)=h2(t+T)=h2=β2𝑒 ϳ𝛼2

The received signal at time t and t +T in matrix form expressed as

𝑥1 𝑥2
(𝑦1
𝑦2
) =( ) (ℎℎ1 )+(𝑛𝑛1 )
−𝑥2 ∗ 𝑥1 ∗ 2 2

Where y1 and y2 are the received signal at time t and t +T and n1 and n2 are independent

zero mean additive white Gaussian noise. The combiner combines the received signal as

𝑥̃1 =h1*y1+h2y2*

𝑥̃2 =h2y1-h1y2*

By substitution some terms in equation we get

𝑥̃1 =(𝛽12 +𝛽22 )x1+h1n*+h2n* ………………………equation(1)

Each transmitting and the receiving antenna pair has a channel, represented by different channel
coefficients. These channel coefficients play a major role in the design of the system. As the
number of antennas increases at both the ends of the channel, the complexity of the system also
increases

𝑥̃2=(𝛽12 +𝛽22 )x2-h1n1*+h2*n2

The encoder and decoder of the Alamouti scheme system is shown in Figure 3.6 and Figure 3.7

Here the information to be transmitted is modulated and fed to the space time encoder. The space
time encoder consists of two transmit antennas as part of the multiple input multiple output
technology [6]. So here the information is transmitted through two separate antennas. Each
transmitting and the receiving antenna pair has a channel, represented by different channel
coefficients. These channel coefficients play a major role in the design of the system. As the
number of antennas increases at both the ends of the channel, the complexity of the system also
increases.

17 | P a g e
 Figure 3-0-7 Alamouti space-time encoder
In the decoder, the received signal is fed to the channel estimator. The estimated coefficients of
the channel together with the combiner are given as the input to the maximum likelihood detector.
The detected signal is then fed to the demodulator. The demodulator gives the original information
which is transmitted.

Figure 3-0-8Alamouti space-time decoder

The space-time block codes are the higher version of the Alamouti scheme. i.e, increement of the

number of antennas of the Alamouti scheme, the space-time block codes will result.

3.7 Receiver Diversity

It is a method used several antennas at receiver side to receive the same signal through different
propagation path and perform combining or selection and switching to improve the received signal
quality. This approach practically applied only to base station to improve their reception quality
because of the cost, size and power of remote units

18 | P a g e
Figure 3-0-9 Receiver diversity with two Receiver antenna
The channel is modeled by complex multiplicative distortion. For two receive antenna channel
between the transmitter antenna and the receive antenna one is

h1=β1𝑒 ϳ𝛼1

and the channel between the transmitter and receiver antenna two is

h2=𝛽2 𝑒 𝑗𝛼2

Noise would be add at two receiver, so that the two received base band signal would given by

y1=h1x1+ n1
y2=ℎ2 𝑥2 +𝑛2

where x1 the signal sent from transmitter, n1 and n2 represent complex noise which is

assumed to be Gaussian distributed with zero mean.

The two-branch Receiver diversity receiver will combine the receive signals as follows:

𝑥̃1 = ℎ1 ∗ 𝑦1 +ℎ2 ∗ 𝑦2

19 | P a g e
 = ℎ1 ∗ (ℎ1 𝑥1 + 𝑛1 ) +ℎ2 ∗ (ℎ2 𝑥2 +𝑛2 )
𝑥̃1 = ( 𝛽1 2 + 𝛽2 2)𝑥1 +ℎ1 ∗ 𝑛1 + ℎ2 ∗ 𝑛2 …………………equation (2)

where 𝛽1 2 =ℎ1 ∗ ℎ1 ,𝛽2 2 =ℎ2 ∗ ℎ2

The maximum likelihood estimate of transmitted signal of x1

Finally, similar to Receiver diversity, the maximum likelihood decision rule is used to at receiver
to choose which symbol was actually transmitted for each of the signals x1 and x2 We can conclude
that from equation (eq1 & eq2) 2x1 Alamouti scheme gives the same diversity order with that of
1x2 Receiver

20 | P a g e
 CHAPTER FOUR

4. DISCUSSION AND RESULTS

In this chapter we will try to demonstrate simulated result of ideas discussed in previous chapters
using MATLB.

Using diversity reception is a well-known technique to mitigate the effects of fading over a
communications link. In Alamouti proposes a transmit diversity scheme that offers similar
diversity gains, using multiple antennas at the transmitter. This was conceived to be more practical
as, for example, it would only require multiple antennas at the base station in comparison to
multiple antennas for every mobile in a cellular communications system.

This section highlights this comparison of transmit vs. receive diversity by simulating coherent
binary phase-shift keying (BPSK) modulation over flat-fading Rayleigh channels. For transmit
diversity, we use two transmit antennas and one receive antenna (2x1 notationally),and two
transmit antennas two receive antennas(2x2 notationally) while for receive diversity we employ
one transmit antenna and two receive antennas (1x2 notationally).

It provides the no-diversity link (single transmit- receive antenna case) and theoretical
performance of second-order diversity link for comparison. It is assumed here that the channel is
known perfectly at the receiver for all systems. We run the simulation over a range of Eb/No
points to generate BER results that allow us to compare the different systems.

In MIMO if the number of antenna element grows the BER will decrease. It decreases linearly in
proportion to large number of antenna elements. In Fig 4.2 clearly show that the system with two
transmit and two receive antenna (TxRx 2x2) has low BER than system with MISO (TxRx
2x1),SIMO (TxRx 1x2) and SISO(TxRx 1x1).

21 | P a g e
Figure 4-1 Bit error rate performance comparison between Alamouti scheme, Receiver diversity
and SISO
The simulation result is shown in Figure It has BER on the y-axis and SNR on the x-axis. The
graph of Alamouti (2Tx, 1Rx) coincides with that Receiver diversity. This is due to
the similarity of equation equation 1and 2 . The BER performance at =10−3 and 10−4 are
tabulated in Tables 4.1 and 4.2 respectively.

22 | P a g e
Table 4-0-1 Performance at BER of 10−3

S.no m× 𝑛 Diversity SNR Observation

1 1Tx1Rx None 20 Above 10−3 BER at the highest SNR of 20Db

SISO
2 1Tx2Rx Receiver 14 There is a 3dB difference with 1Tx,2Rx (i.e. 14- 11=3dB)

SIMO
3 2Tx1Rx Transmiter 14 As above
MISO
4 2Tx2Rx 2-nd order 11 Lowest power than others, improved performance

MIMO

The performance gain of MISO and MIMO is 3dB higher than that of SIMO. In Table 4.2 , at
BER of 10−4, the SNR for Receive diversity (SIMO) is 16.9dB; Transmit diversity (MISO) is
16.8dB and second-order diversity (MIMO) is 14.2dB. There is also an approximate 3dB
difference between Receive diversity and the other two forms of diversity.

The resulting simulation results show that using two transmit antennas and one receive antenna
provides the same diversity order as one transmit antenna and two receiver antenna system of one
transmit antenna and two receive antennas.

Also observe that transmit diversity has a 3 dB disadvantage when compared to receiver diversity.
This is because we modelled the total transmitted power to be the same in both cases. If we
calibrate the transmitted power such that the received power for these two cases is the same, then
the performance would be identical. The theoretical performance of second-order diversity link
matches the transmit diversity system as it normalizes the total power across all the diversity
branches.

23 | P a g e
Table 4-2 Performance at BER of 10−4

S.no m× 𝑛 Diversity SNR Observation

1 1Tx1Rx None None None

SISO
2 1Tx2Rx Receiver 16.9 There is a 3dB difference with 1Tx,2Rx (i.e. 14-
SIMO 11=3dB)
3 2Tx1Rx Transmitter 16.8 As above
MISO
4 2Tx2Rx 2-nd order 14.2 Lowest power than others, improved
MIMO performance

24 | P a g e
 CHAPTER FIVE

5. CONCLUSION AND FURTHER WORK

5.1 CONCLUSION
This thesis is devoted to space-time coding for multiple- input/multiple-output (MIMO) systems.
The concept of space-time coding is explained in a systematic way.

This thesis gives a basic overview of the MIMO technology. A basic introduction to Space-Time
Coding has been provided by presenting Alamouti’s scheme. The Alamouti scheme has been
simulated for BPSK modualation .The better BER curve produced by a system which uses more
number of antennas at both sides of the communication link.

The most significant result of this study was the observation that the system performance improved
as the number of antennas at either side of the communication system was increased. As more
antennas were added to the conventional single antenna systems, higher diversity gains improved
the performance. Obviously, the system with the largest number of antennas, i.e., the 2×2 system
in this work, outperformed all other systems with fewer antennas by exploiting the spatial diversity
gain.It is shown in this thesis using BER comparison from the simulation results that the
application of multiple-antennas as against single antenna has the capability to operate with
minimal error. Hence better performance in the face of multipath propagation effects of
importance is the diversity gain using Transmit Diversity technique. This is an improvement on
systems operating on Receive Diversity and those without diversity techniques (SISO). Therefore,
multiple-antenna systems employing Transmit Diversity technique is a more robust transmission
method. The 3dB advantage over other systems can translate to stronger signal strength with high
resistance to interfering signals.

25 | P a g e
5.2 Further Works
This thesis project limited only on simple space time block code (Alamouti‟s coding ) which is
focus only to enhance diversity . However, further works could be done in other schemes which
are enhancing both the capacity of channel and diversity. Moreover, MIMO Channel modeling

the key area in wireless system and it needs more work.

26 | P a g e
 REFERENCE

1) M.Jankiraman, “Space-Time Codes and MIMO Systems.” Norwood, MA, USA:

ArtechHouse,Incorporated,2004.p313.http://site.ebrary.com/lib/vaxjo/Doc?id=10081979&ppg=3 2)T.M.
Duman ,A.Ghrayeb “Coding for MIMO Communication Systems,” John Wiley and Sons Ltd ,England
,2007

3) T. S. Rappaport,” Wireless Communications: Principles and Practice (2nd Edition)” Prentice Hall. Dec
31, 2007 [4] J.G. Proakis “Digital Communications (3rd edition)” McGraw-Hill ,Inc ,U.S.A,1995

4) Bliss et al. (2005). MIMO Wireless Communication. Lincoln Laboratory Journal, 15

5) Alexandrapoulos et al., (2007). On The Multivariate Weibull Fading Model with Arbitrary Correlation
Matrix. IEEE Antennas Wireless propag. Lett., 6, 93-95.
6) Papadimitrou et al. (2009). On the Weibull Distribution with Arbitrary Correlation.
3rd International Symposium on Communications, Control and Signal Processing, St
Julians,Malta.
7) Mark, J. & Zhuang, W. (2003). Wireless Communication and Networking, Prentice Hall.
8) Jiang et al. (2011). Performance Analysis of ZF and MMSE Equalizers for MIMO Systems: An In-
Depth Study of the High SNR Regime. IEEE Transactions on Information Theory
9) Agubor et al. (2014). Comparative Analysis of Multiple and Single Antenna
Applications in Wireless Communication. Academic Research International, 5(2),148-160.
10) Papadimitriou, Z. G. (2010). Performance Analysis of Wireless Single-Input, Multiple-Output
systems (SIMO) in Correlated Weibull Fading Channels. Available at
http://cgi.di.uoa.gr/~phdsbook/files/papadimitriouZaf.pdf
11) So, J. W., & Cioffi, J. M. (2008). Capacity and Fairness in Multiuser Diversity
Systems with Opportunistic Feedback. IEEE Communications letters, 12(9), 648-650.
12) Song et al. (2009). Exploiting Multiuser Diversity for Fair Scheduling in MIMO
Downlink Networks with Imperfect Channel State Information. IEEE Trans. On Communication
13) Wang et al. (2008). A Game-theoretic Approach for Exploiting Multiuser Diversity in
Cooperative slotted ALOHA, IEEE Trans.on Wireless Communications, 7(11), part 1
14) Agubor et al. (2013). A Review of Diversity Techniques for Wireless Communication Systems.
Academic Research International, 4(2), 157-165.

27 | P a g e
 APPENDIX A

MATLAB Code to determine Pefromance of Aalmouti Code

frmLen = 100; % frame length
numPackets = 1000; % number of packets
EbNo = 0:2:20; % Eb/No varying to 20 dB
N = 2; % maximum number of Tx antennas
M = 2; % maximum number of Rx antennas
% Create comm.BPSKModulator and comm.BPSKDemodulator System objects
P = 2; % modulation order
hMod = comm.BPSKModulator;
hDemod = comm.BPSKDemodulator('OutputDataType','double');
% Create comm.STBCEncoder and comm.STBCCombiner System objects
hAlamoutiEnc = comm.OSTBCEncoder;
hAlamoutiDec = comm.OSTBCCombiner;
% Create two comm.AWGNChannel System objects for one and two receive
% antennas respectively. Set the NoiseMethod property of the channel to
% 'Signal to noise ratio (Eb/No)' to specify the noise level using the
% energy per bit to noise power spectral density ratio (Eb/No). The output
% of the BPSK modulator generates unit power signals; set the SignalPower
% property to 1 Watt.
hAWGN1Rx = comm.AWGNChannel('NoiseMethod', 'Signal to noise ratio
(Eb/No)',...
'SignalPower', 1);
hAWGN2Rx = clone(hAWGN1Rx);
% Create comm.ErrorRate calculator System objects to evaluate BER.
hErrorCalc1 = comm.ErrorRate;
hErrorCalc2 = comm.ErrorRate;
hErrorCalc3 = comm.ErrorRate;
% Since the comm.AWGNChannel System objects as well as the RANDI function
% use the default random stream, the following commands are executed so
% that the results will be repeatable, i.e., same results will be obtained
% for every run of the example. The default stream will be restored at the
% end of the example.
s = RandStream.create('mt19937ar', 'seed',55408);
prevStream = RandStream.setGlobalStream(s);
% Pre-allocate variables for speed

28 | P a g e
H = zeros(frmLen, N, M);
ber_noDiver = zeros(3,length(EbNo));
ber_Alamouti = zeros(3,length(EbNo));
ber_MaxRatio = zeros(3,length(EbNo));
ber_thy2 = zeros(1,length(EbNo));
% Set up a figure for visualizing BER results
h = gcf; grid on; hold on;
set(gca, 'yscale', 'log', 'xlim', [EbNo(1), EbNo(end)], 'ylim', [1e-4 1]);
xlabel('SNR in (dB)'); ylabel('BER'); set(h,'NumberTitle','off');
set(h, 'renderer', 'zbuffer'); set(h,'Name','BER for BPSK Modulaiton with
Alamouti STBC');
title('BER for BPSK Modulaiton with Alamouti STBC');
% Loop over several EbNo points
for idx = 1:length(EbNo)
reset(hErrorCalc1);
reset(hErrorCalc2);
reset(hErrorCalc3);
% Set the EbNo property of the AWGNChannel System objects
hAWGN1Rx.EbNo = EbNo(idx);
hAWGN2Rx.EbNo = EbNo(idx);
% Loop over the number of packets
for packetIdx = 1:numPackets
% Generate data vector per frame
data = randi([0 P-1], frmLen, 1);
% Modulate data
modData = step(hMod, data);
% Alamouti Space-Time Block Encoder
encData = step(hAlamoutiEnc, modData);
% Create the Rayleigh distributed channel response matrix
% for two transmit and two receive antennas
H(1:N:end, :, :) = (randn(frmLen/2, N, M) + ...
1i*randn(frmLen/2, N, M))/sqrt(2);
% assume held constant for 2 symbol periods
H(2:N:end, :, :) = H(1:N:end, :, :);
% Extract part of H to represent the 1x1, 2x1 and 1x2 channels
H11 = H(:,1,1); H21 = H(:,:,1)/sqrt(2); H12 = squeeze(H(:,1,:));
% Pass through the channels
chanOut11 = H11 .* modData;

29 | P a g e
chanOut21 = sum(H21.* encData, 2);
chanOut12 = H12 .* repmat(modData, 1, 2);
% Add AWGN
rxSig11 = step(hAWGN1Rx, chanOut11);
rxSig21 = step(hAWGN1Rx, chanOut21);
rxSig12 = step(hAWGN2Rx, chanOut12);
% Alamouti Space-Time Block Combiner
decData = step(hAlamoutiDec, rxSig21, H21);
% ML Detector (minimum Euclidean distance)
demod11 = step(hDemod, rxSig11.*conj(H11));
demod21 = step(hDemod, decData);
demod12 = step(hDemod, sum(rxSig12.*conj(H12), 2));
% Calculate and update BER for current EbNo value
% for uncoded 1x1 system
ber_noDiver(:,idx) = step(hErrorCalc1, data, demod11);
% for Alamouti coded 2x1 system
ber_Alamouti(:,idx) = step(hErrorCalc2, data, demod21);
% for Maximal-ratio combined 1x2 system
ber_MaxRatio(:,idx) = step(hErrorCalc3, data, demod12);
end % end of FOR loop for numPackets
% Calculate theoretical second-order diversity BER for current EbNo
ber_thy2(idx) = berfading(EbNo(idx), 'psk', 2, 2);
% Plot results
semilogy(EbNo(1:idx), ber_noDiver(1,1:idx), 'r*', ...
EbNo(1:idx), ber_Alamouti(1,1:idx), 'go', ...
EbNo(1:idx), ber_MaxRatio(1,1:idx), 'bs', ...
EbNo(1:idx), ber_thy2(1:idx), 'm');
legend('SISO(1Tx,1Rx)', 'Alamouti (2Tx, 1Rx)',...
'Alamouti(1Tx,2Rx)', ...
'Rx Diversity(2tx2r)');
drawnow;
end % end of for loop for EbNo
% Perform curve fitting and replot the results
fitBER11 = berfit(EbNo, ber_noDiver(1,:));
fitBER21 = berfit(EbNo, ber_Alamouti(1,:));
fitBER12 = berfit(EbNo, ber_MaxRatio(1,:));
semilogy(EbNo, fitBER11, 'r', EbNo, fitBER21, 'g', EbNo, fitBER12, 'b');
hold on;

30 | P a g e
% Restore default stream
RandStream.setGlobalStream(prevStream);

31 | P a g e