Relay Quantization for MIMO Reception Capacity
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current relay techniques in wireless communication systems, such as Decode & Forward and Amplify & Forward, face inefficiencies and increased complexity, particularly when multiple relay devices are involved, leading to reduced capacity and performance.
Innovation Solution
A communication system that uses a receive front end to generate signal samples, determines quantization levels based on noise indication to minimize noise contribution, and transmits these samples for Multiple In Multiple Out (MIMO) reception, allowing for efficient and low-complexity relay communication.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If Amplify & Forward technique is used to improve reception quality, then signal combination capability is improved, but communication capacity is reduced due to substantial resource consumption
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the essential signal information needed for relaying rather than transmitting complete sampled data. The relay station quantizes received signals and transmits only quantized values, removing redundant information while preserving reception quality improvement benefits.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of the conventional approach where the relay transmits full sampled data to the destination, the patent inverts the approach by having the destination perform MIMO reception using quantized values from the relay, combining this with direct signals from the source to achieve both reliability improvement and capacity preservation.
2Reliability
If Decode & Forward technique is used to improve communication reliability, then signal decoding capability is improved, but system complexity increases particularly when multiple relay devices are involved
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses simple quantization operations at the relay station instead of complex decoding and re-encoding operations. The quantized values are low-complexity representations that can be easily processed, replacing the computationally intensive D&F operations with simpler, more efficient quantization and transmission.
3Productivity
If compress-and-forward with Wyner-Ziv coding is used to reduce resource consumption, then communication efficiency is improved, but implementation complexity and computational requirements increase substantially
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces complex Wyner-Ziv coding with simple uniform or non-uniform quantization that can be easily implemented without sophisticated algorithms. The quantized values transmitted by the relay are sufficient for the destination to perform effective MIMO reception, eliminating the need for complex compression and decompression operations.
Data Source
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AI summary
A communication system employs relaying of communication signals. A first communication unit (105) comprises a receive front end (201, 203) generating time domain signal samples for a signal received from a source communication unit (101). A noise processor (205) generates a noise indication for the samples and a quantisation level processor (207) determines quantisation levels such that a noise contribution resulting from quantising relative to the noise indication meets a criterion. A quantisation processor (209) generates quantised signal samples by quantising the samples using the quantisation levels. A transmit unit (211) transmits the quantised signal samples to a second communication unit (103) which comprises a receiver (309) for receiving these. A receive front end (301, 303, 305, 309) of the second communication unit (103) generates receive signal samples for the signal from the source communication unit (101) and a MIMO receive processor (311) performs a Multiple In Multiple Out, MIMO, reception of the signal using these samples and the quantised signal samples from the first communication unit (105).