Common Antenna Beamforming for Inter-Sector Interference Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional beamforming in wireless communication systems reduces beamforming gain near sector boundaries due to lack of interference control across sectors, leading to complex antenna configurations and reduced signal strength.
Innovation Solution
A base station apparatus and method that calculates a beam coefficient considering interference to neighbor sectors, using common antennas for all sectors to perform beamforming, thereby eliminating inter-sector interference and maintaining consistent signal strength across the sector.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If beamforming is performed separately in each sector using per-sector antennas, then interference control within a sector is improved, but beamforming gain at sector boundaries is reduced and device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges per-sector antenna operations into a common antenna pool that serves all sectors. Instead of having separate antenna groups for each sector, a single set of antennas is shared across all sectors, enabling coordinated beamforming that maintains signal strength at sector boundaries while reducing interference through joint processing.
Solution Approach 2:
The common antennas serve multiple sectors simultaneously, performing universal beamforming functions for all sectors rather than being dedicated to a single sector. This multi-functional approach allows the same antenna resources to be dynamically allocated and optimized for different sector directions, eliminating the need for separate per-sector antenna configurations.
2Adaptability or versatility
If per-sector antennas are used for beamforming, then sector-specific beamforming is achieved, but device complexity and construction cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple per-sector antenna groups into a single common antenna pool, reducing the total number of antennas required. By merging redundant per-sector antenna configurations into shared resources, the system achieves sector-specific beamforming capabilities through software coordination rather than hardware duplication.
Solution Approach 2:
The common antenna pool provides universal service to all sectors, with each antenna capable of contributing to beamforming in any sector direction. This universal design eliminates the need for dedicated per-sector antenna hardware, reducing construction complexity while maintaining adaptability through flexible beamforming algorithms.
3Object-generated harmful factors
If beamforming signal magnitude is reduced at sector boundaries to control interference, then inter-sector interference is minimized, but beamforming gain for mobile stations at sector boundaries is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements joint beamforming across all sectors that incorporates feedback about interference conditions and channel states from all sectors. This coordinated approach dynamically adjusts beamforming weights to suppress interference in specific directions while maintaining or enhancing signal strength at sector boundaries, avoiding the need to uniformly reduce signal magnitude.
Solution Approach 2:
By merging the beamforming operations of all sectors into a unified joint processing framework, the system can coordinate signal transmission across sector boundaries. This combined approach allows constructive interference to be exploited at sector boundaries while destructive interference is suppressed in other directions, simultaneously achieving interference control and maintaining beamforming gain.
Data Source
AI summary
An apparatus and method for beamforming in a wireless communication system are provided. The base station apparatus includes a calculator, a plurality of formers, and a plurality of adders. The calculator calculates a beam coefficient considering interference to a neighbor sector to be applied to transmission signals to mobile stations. The plurality of formers performs beamforming for a transmission signal to each mobile station within a corresponding sector using the beam coefficient. The plurality of adders adds the sector-based beamformed signals each provided from the plurality of formers, on a per-transmission-antenna basis.