Intelligent surface-Aided transmitter architectures for millimeter-wave ultra massive mimo systems

Jamali Kooshkghazi V, Tulino AM, Fischer G, Müller R, Schober R (2021)

Publication Type: Journal article

Publication year: 2021

Journal

Book Volume: 2

Pages Range: 144-167

Article Number: 9310290

DOI: 10.1109/OJCOMS.2020.3048063

Abstract

In this article, we study two novel massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) transmitter architectures for millimeter wave (mmWave) communications which comprise few active antennas, each equipped with a dedicated radio frequency (RF) chain, that illuminate a nearby large intelligent reflecting/transmitting surface (IRS/ITS). The IRS (ITS) consists of a large number of low-cost and energy-efficient passive antenna elements which are able to reflect (transmit) a phase-shifted version of the incident electromagnetic field. Similar to lens array (LA) antennas, IRS/ITS-Aided antenna architectures are energy efficient due to the almost lossless over-The-Air connection between the active antennas and the intelligent surface. However, unlike for LA antennas, for which the number of active antennas has to linearly grow with the number of passive elements (i.e., the lens aperture) due to the non-reconfigurablility (i.e., non-intelligence) of the lens, for IRS/ITS-Aided antennas, the reconfigurablility of the IRS/ITS facilitates scaling up the number of radiating passive elements without increasing the number of costly and bulky active antennas. We show that the constraints that the precoders for IRS/ITS-Aided antennas have to meet differ from those of conventional MIMO architectures. Taking these constraints into account and exploiting the sparsity of mmWave channels, we design two efficient precoders; one based on maximizing the mutual information and one based on approximating the optimal unconstrained fully digital (FD) precoder via the orthogonal matching pursuit algorithm. Furthermore, we develop a power consumption model for IRS/ITS-Aided antennas that takes into account the impacts of the IRS/ITS imperfections, namely the spillover loss, taper loss, aperture loss, and phase shifter loss. Moreover, we study the effect that the various system parameters have on the achievable rate and show that a proper positioning of the active antennas with respect to the IRS/ITS leads to a considerable performance improvement. Our simulation results reveal that unlike conventional MIMO architectures, IRS/ITS-Aided antennas are both highly energy efficient and fully scalable in terms of the number of transmitting (passive) antennas. Therefore, IRS/ITS-Aided antennas are promising candidates for realizing the potential of mmWave ultra massive MIMO communications in practice.

Authors with CRIS profile

Involved external institutions

Nokia Bell Labs United States (USA) (US)

How to cite

APA:

Jamali Kooshkghazi, V., Tulino, A.M., Fischer, G., Müller, R., & Schober, R. (2021). Intelligent surface-Aided transmitter architectures for millimeter-wave ultra massive mimo systems. IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society, 2, 144-167. https://doi.org/10.1109/OJCOMS.2020.3048063

MLA:

Jamali Kooshkghazi, Vahid, et al. "Intelligent surface-Aided transmitter architectures for millimeter-wave ultra massive mimo systems." IEEE Open Journal of the Communications Society 2 (2021): 144-167.

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