Classifications

• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04B—TRANSMISSION
  • H04B17/00—Monitoring; Testing
  • H04B17/20—Monitoring; Testing of receivers
  • H04B17/21—Monitoring; Testing of receivers for calibration; for correcting measurements
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W72/00—Local resource management
  • H04W72/50—Allocation or scheduling criteria for wireless resources
  • H04W72/54—Allocation or scheduling criteria for wireless resources based on quality criteria
  • H04W72/542—Allocation or scheduling criteria for wireless resources based on quality criteria using measured or perceived quality
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04B—TRANSMISSION
  • H04B7/00—Radio transmission systems, i.e. using radiation field
  • H04B7/02—Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas
  • H04B7/04—Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas using two or more spaced independent antennas
  • H04B7/06—Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas using two or more spaced independent antennas at the transmitting station
  • H04B7/0613—Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas using two or more spaced independent antennas at the transmitting station using simultaneous transmission
  • H04B7/0615—Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas using two or more spaced independent antennas at the transmitting station using simultaneous transmission of weighted versions of same signal
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L1/00—Arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received
  • H04L1/0001—Systems modifying transmission characteristics according to link quality, e.g. power backoff
  • H04L1/0023—Systems modifying transmission characteristics according to link quality, e.g. power backoff characterised by the signalling
  • H04L1/0026—Transmission of channel quality indication
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L1/00—Arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received
  • H04L1/02—Arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received by diversity reception
  • H04L1/06—Arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received by diversity reception using space diversity
  • H04L1/0618—Space-time coding
  • H04L1/0625—Transmitter arrangements
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L5/00—Arrangements affording multiple use of the transmission path
  • H04L5/003—Arrangements for allocating sub-channels of the transmission path
  • H04L5/0058—Allocation criteria
  • H04L5/006—Quality of the received signal, e.g. BER, SNR, water filling

Definitions

• the invention relates generally to wireless communications systems, and more particularly, to managing channel quality indicators in a multi-user multiple-input multiple-output wireless communications network.
• the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3 GPP) was established to produce globally applicable technical specifications and technical reports for a 3rd generation mobile system based on evolved Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) core networks and the radio access technologies that they support (i.e., Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA) in both Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) and Time Division Duplex (TDD) modes).
• GSM Global System for Mobile communications
• UTRA Universal Terrestrial Radio Access
• FDD Frequency Division Duplex
• TDD Time Division Duplex
• the scope was subsequently amended to include the maintenance and development of the GSM technical specifications and technical reports including evolved radio access technologies (e.g., General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) and Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE)).
• GPRS General Packet Radio Service
• EDGE Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution
• the scheduler of an evolved Node B when operating in multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) mode, the scheduler of an evolved Node B (eNB) needs channel quality indicators (CQIs) from the multiple different user equipments (UEs) to make scheduling decisions.
• CQIs are generated at the UEs and transmitted to the eNB.
• SU-MIMO single-user multiple-input multiple-output
• the CQIs can be accurately calculated by the UEs because the UEs have all of the information necessary to calculate the CQIs, which includes the equivalent channel matrix, the usage scheme of each spatial subchannel, and the inter-cell interference plus additive noise.
• the UEs when operating in MU-MIMO mode, the UEs do not necessarily know the usage scheme (pre-coding) that will be used in the next transmission time interval (TTI) for each spatial sub-channel.
• TTI transmission time interval
• different spatial sub-channel usage schemes will result in different intra-cell interference and consequently different CQIs.
• the UE would need to calculate different CQIs for each different spatial sub-channel usage scheme and then provide the different CQIs to the eNB through uplink signaling.
• a drawback to calculating multiple different CQIs at each UE and transmitting the multiple different CQIs to the eNB is that these operations consume valuable UE processing and uplink signaling resources.
• a technique for operating a wireless communications system that supports MU- MIMO communications between a base station and multiple mobile stations involves generating inter-cell interference information at the mobile stations and providing the inter-cell interference information to the base station.
• the base station uses the inter-cell interference information to calculate CQIs and then makes scheduling decisions in response to the CQIs.
• Data is transmitted from the base station to the mobile stations according to the scheduling decisions.
• inter-cell interference information is generated at the UEs and transmitted to the eNB.
• CQIs are calculated for the UEs using the eNB' s knowledge of the equivalent channel matrix and the usage scheme of each spatial sub-channel along with the inter-cell interference information that is transmitted from the UEs. Because the eNB has the inter-cell interference information from the UEs along with the equivalent channel matrix and the usage scheme of each spatial sub-channel, the calculated CQIs accurately reflect the conditions at the UEs.
• the calculated CQIs are then used to make scheduling decisions at the eNB and data is transmitted between the eNB and the UEs according to the scheduling decisions. Calculating the CQIs at the eNB instead of at the UEs avoids the need to have the UE calculate multiple different CQIs and avoids the need to burden the uplink channels with carrying those CQIs to the eNB.
• Fig. 1 depicts a wireless communications system that supports MU-MIMO communications between a base station and multiple mobile stations.
• Fig. 2 illustrates a signaling timeline between a base station and a mobile station in a wireless communications system in which CQIs are calculated at the base station instead of at the mobile stations.
• Fig. 3 illustrates a signaling timeline between an eNB and a UE in a wireless communications system in which CQIs are calculated at the eNB using inter-cell interference information from the UE, where the inter-cell interference information is provided to the eNB as mean values, standard deviations, and an index.
• Fig. 4 depicts an eNB and a UE that are configured to operate as described above with reference to Figs. 2 and 3.
• Fig. 5 is a process flow diagram of a method for operating a wireless communications system that supports MU-MIMO communications between a base station and multiple mobile stations.
• Fig. 6 is a graph of the number of index bits relative to signal to noise error.
• MU-MIMO Multi-user multiple-input multiple-output
• Fig. 1 depicts a wireless communications system 100 that includes a base station 102 (referred to herein as an evolved Node B (eNB)) and multiple mobile stations 104 (referred to herein as user equipments (UEs)).
• the wireless communications system is operated in MU-MIMO mode using time division duplexing (TDD).
• the eNB is a wireless communications base station that supports MU-MIMO operation as specified in the 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) specification.
• LTE Long Term Evolution
• the eNB includes four antennas 106 although the eNB can include more than four antennas.
• LTE Long Term Evolution
• the UEs are wireless communications mobile stations that support MU-MIMO operation as specified in the 3GPP LTE specification.
• Each of the UEs has two antennas 108, although the UEs are not limited to two antennas (e.g., the UEs can include only one antenna or more than two antennas).
• a MU-MIMO wireless communications system that includes M independently encoded data streams to be transmitted from an eNB to at most M UEs, the data symbols
• L ' 2 '" M i A channel that exists between a transmit antenna and a receive antenna is denoted by an r ' complex matrix H s where, ' is the transmit antenna number and r is the receive antenna number.
• the r receive antennas are distributed among M UEs and each UE can be equipped with a single antenna or multiple antennas.
• Each entity of H denoted by 1J represents the channel gain between receive antenna ' and transmit antenna J .
• the transmitter multiplies the data symbol vector ⁇ according to a pre-coding matrix E s which is an ' matrix.
• E s which is an ' matrix.
• ' 2 '" Mr is the signal vector at the receiving antennas of the UEs and z is the inter-cell interference plus additive noise, where the inter-cell interference plus additive noise is referred to herein simply as inter-cell interference.
• HE can be expressed as L l 2 3 ' " J and is referred to as the equivalent channel matrix.
• the columns of H are referred to as spatial sub-channels since they are the actual vector channels that carry the user data.
• the CQI is expressed as an integer index.
• the CQI is expressed as one of thirty-two CQI indexes with each CQI index having a corresponding signal-to-noise ratio (SINR) threshold.
• SINR signal-to-noise ratio
• a CQI is calculated by calculating the SINR of a channel and then selecting the CQI index that has the highest SINR threshold that is less than the calculated SINR.
• the eNB In order to accurately calculate the CQI of each UE, the eNB needs three pieces of information: 1) the equivalent channel matrix; 2) the usage scheme of each spatial sub-channel (e.g., the size or number of columns, and therefore the specific selection of the preceding matrix, E, from a pre-defined set of candidate pre-coding matrices); and 3) the inter-cell interference plus additive noise at the UE.
• Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) is used by the UEs as the baseline receiver detection method.
• a calculation of the detected signal at a UE is described below for a wireless communications system operating in MU-MIMO mode in which the eNB has four transmit antennas, there are four single-antenna UEs, and all four of the spatial sub-channels are in use.
• K 7 (PYi 2 Yi 2 " + PYi 3 Yi 3 " + PYi 4 Yi 4 " + ⁇ ” ) where, 7 V 2 2 3 3 4 4 / (4)
• e is the calculated SINR of the received signal which can be used to select a CQI index.
• 7 is a temporary matrix used to calculate the CQI, which is derived from the detection algorithm of the MMSE receiver and P is the
• CQIs are calculated at the UEs and fed back to the eNB.
• the UEs When in SU-MIMO mode, the UEs have access to the equivalent channel matrix, the usage scheme, and the inter-cell interference and therefore the desired CQIs can be calculated at the UEs and fed back to the eNB.
• the usage scheme is known only at the eNB and not provided to the UEs. Therefore, the UEs do not have all of the information necessary to calculate the CQIs.
• the calculated CQIs will vary significantly depending on the assumptions that are made with respect to usage schemes for each spatial sub-channel.
• each UE would have to calculate multiple CQIs based on various different usage assumptions and provide those CQIs to the eNB through an uplink channel. The calculation and transmission of multiple CQIs at each UE would significantly impact UE processing and uplink signaling utilization.
• inter-cell interference information is generated at the UEs and transmitted to the eNB.
• CQIs are calculated for the UEs using the eNB' s knowledge of the equivalent channel matrix and the usage scheme of each spatial sub-channel along with the inter-cell interference information that is transmitted from the UEs. Because the eNB has the inter-cell interference information from the UEs along with the equivalent channel matrix and the usage scheme of each spatial sub-channel, the calculated CQIs accurately reflect the conditions at the UEs.
• the calculated CQIs are used to make scheduling decisions at the eNB and data is transmitted between the eNB and the UEs according to the scheduling decisions.
• Fig. 2 illustrates a signaling timeline between a base station (e.g., eNB 102) and a mobile station (e.g., UEs 104) in a wireless communications system 100 (Fig. 1) in which CQIs are calculated at the base station instead of at the mobile stations.
• inter-cell interference information 110 is generated at a mobile station and then transmitted from the mobile station to the base station.
• the inter-cell interference information includes information about the signals that were received at the UE.
• the base station uses the inter-cell interference information to calculate a CQI and uses the CQI to make a scheduling decision.
• a scheduling decision may involve both scheduling and resource allocation parameters including, for example, the selection of transmission frequencies and spatial sub-channels to use for each UE.
• Data 112 is then transmitted from the base station to the mobile station according to the scheduling decision.
• the inter-cell interference information is provided to the eNB as mean values, standard deviations, and an index.
• the inter-cell interference, z is a 2x 1
• ⁇ ⁇ complex vector that can be expressed as: ⁇ ⁇ .
• the expression includes four entries a, b, c, and d, which represent the real and imaginary parts of z and it can be assumed that both a and " follow Gaussian distribution with a corresponding mean value ( ⁇ 1 ) and a corresponding standard deviation ( ⁇ 2) and that both c and d follow a Gaussian distribution with a corresponding mean value ( " 2 ) and a corresponding standard deviation ⁇ ⁇ i 2).
• ⁇ ⁇ complex vector that can be expressed as: ⁇ ⁇ .
• the expression includes four entries a, b, c, and d, which represent the real and imaginary parts of z and it can be assumed that both a and " follow Gaussian distribution with a corresponding mean value ( ⁇ 1 ) and a corresponding standard deviation ( ⁇ 2) and that both c and d follow a Gaussian distribution with a corresponding mean value ( " 2 ) and a corresponding standard deviation
• N ⁇ N N • • "N i
• codebook ⁇ °' l ' 2 ⁇ 1 >
• Table 1 is an example of a codebook for a, b, c, and d in which sixteen different codebook entries are uniquely identified using a 4-bit index.
• the specificity of the codebook is a function of the number of codebook entries. A codebook with more entries and thus finer granularity requires an index with more bits to uniquely identify each entry and a codebook with fewer entries can be represented with an index having fewer bits. The size of the codebook is implementation specific.
• each UE calculates the mean value and standard deviation of both of the signals received at its two antennas.
• the mean is the mean value and standard deviation of both of the signals received at its two antennas.
• 2 2 value and standard deviation for each received signal, ⁇ 1 ' 0"1 and ⁇ 2 '* 72 , are calculated based on all of the inter-cell interference information measured in a long period (e.g. 1 radio frame).
• the mean and standard deviation are both quantized as mx lO " 5 w here m is represented by three bits and n is represented by three bits.
• the mean values and standard deviations are transmitted to the eNB for use in calculating CQIs.
• the normalized inter-cell interference, z is then mapped to a nearest vector ' in the codebook as follows:
• the index is transmitted to the eNB.
• the index is transmitted to the eNB separately from the mean values and standard deviations.
• the inter-cell interference, z can be regenerated at the eNB.
• the inter-cell interference is regenerated at the eNB as follows:
• the eNB uses the regenerated inter-cell interference, z , to calculate at least one CQI for the corresponding UE.
• the eNB uses the calculated CQI(s) to make a scheduling decision.
• Data is transmitted from the eNB to the UE according to the scheduling decision. Since the mean values and standard deviations will change at a relatively low frequency, in an embodiment, the mean values and standard deviations for the received signals are provided to the eNB on a relatively long interval, e.g. every 10 radio frames, while the index is provided to the eNB at a relatively short interval, e.g., every TTI which is approximately 10ms in the LTE TDD Type 1 frame structure.
• Fig. 3 illustrates a signaling timeline between an eNB and a UE in a wireless communications system in which CQIs are calculated at the eNB using inter-cell interference information from the UE, where the inter-cell interference information is provided to the eNB as mean values, standard deviations, and an index.
• the eNB provides the UE with a codebook 120 for use in selecting an index.
• the codebook could be static or semi-static depending on the application.
• the codebook is provided to multiple UEs via a broadcast or common control channel.
• the UE receives signals from the eNB, measures a characteristic of the received signals (e.g., signal power), and calculates the mean value and standard deviation of each received signal.
• a characteristic of the received signals e.g., signal power
• the UE selects an index that represents the measured characteristics of the received signals.
• the mean values, standard deviations, and index are all transmitted to the eNB.
• the mean values and standard deviations 122 are transmitted together at a relatively long period (e.g., one data set every 10 radio frames) and the index, i, 124 is transmitted separately at a relatively short period (e.g., one index every TTI, e.g., 10ms in the LTE TDD Type 1 frame structure).
• the eNB uses the inter-cell interference information, which was provided as mean values, standard deviations, and an index, to calculate a CQI or multiple CQIs under
• the eNB uses the CQIs to make a scheduling decision or multiple scheduling decisions and user data 126 is transmitted to the UE according to the scheduling decision(s).
• the eNB may also transmit scheduling and control information 128, which is related to the scheduling decision, to the UE.
• Fig. 4 depicts functional block diagrams of an eNB 102 and a UE 104, which are configured to implement the above-described technique in a MU-MIMO environment.
• the eNB includes a codebook module 140, a CQI calculator 142, a scheduler 144, and a
• the MU-MIMO transmitter 146 The codebook module is the source of the codebook that is distributed from the eNB to the UE.
• the CQI calculator calculates CQIs in response to the inter-cell interference information that is received from the UE.
• the scheduler makes scheduling decisions using the CQIs that are generated by the CQI calculator.
• the MU- MIMO transmitter transmits information, including the codebook, user data, and scheduling and control information to the UE.
• the UE includes an interference calculator 150, a codebook module 152, an index selector 154, a signal receive and measurement module 156, and a transmitter 158.
• the signal receive and measurement module receives and measures signals that are received on the UE 's antennas.
• the interference calculator calculates the mean and standard deviation for the received signals in response to measurement information generated by the signal receive and measurement module.
• the codebook module stores the codebook and the index selector selects an index from the codebook in response to the received signals.
• the transmitter transmits the mean values, the standard deviations, and the index to the base station for use in calculating CQIs.
• inter-cell interference information is generated at a mobile station.
• the inter-cell interference information is transmitted from the mobile station to the base station.
• a CQI is calculated at the base station for the mobile station using the inter-cell interference information transmitted from the mobile station.
• a scheduling decision is made at the base station in response to the CQI.
• data is transmitted from the base station to the mobile station according to the scheduling decision.
• the above-described technique can be implemented in a manner that reduces the amount of uplink signaling that is required to operate a wireless communications system in MU-MIMO mode relative to conventional techniques in which the CQIs are generated at the UEs.
• the eNB has four transmit antennas and a UE has two receive antennas, resulting in four spatial channels.
• the resulting feedback signaling overhead can be calculated as indicated in Table 2.
• MCS modulation and coding scheme
• the overhead of 18.4 bits per 10ms represents over a 42% reduction in overhead as compared to the conventional technique as described with reference to Table 2.
• the CQI calculation error for the technique described with reference to Figs. 1 - 4 is compared to an ideal CQI calculation in the graph of Fig. 6, which plots the number of index bits on the x-axis against the SINR error on the y-axis.
• the codebook ranges in size from four bits to sixteen bits and the relative linear absolute error between the estimated SINR (in linear units) and the accurate SINR is used as the performance metric.
• the SINR error 160 is very small when the index is more than about twelve bits. The small error reflected in Fig. 6 will tend to improve the accuracy of MCS selection, and the Block Error Rate (BLER) performance will likely be close to the ideal scheme.
• the above-described technique takes advantage of channel reciprocity between the eNB and UEs in the TDD wireless communications system, wherein channel reciprocity involves essentially equivalent channel responses in the uplink and downlink directions.

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• Signal Processing (AREA)
• Computer Networks & Wireless Communication (AREA)
• Quality & Reliability (AREA)
• Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
• Electromagnetism (AREA)
• Mobile Radio Communication Systems (AREA)

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• 2007
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• 2008
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