Body-centric ultra-wideband multi-channel characterisation and spatial diversity in the indoor environment

Abstract

This study presents the findings of an empirical channel characterisation for an ultra-wideband off-body optic fibre-fed multiple-antenna array within an office and corridor environment. The results show that for received power experiments, the office and corridor were best modelled by lognormal and Rician distributions, respectively [for both line of sight (LOS) and non-LOS (NLOS) scenarios]. In the office, LOS measurements for tmean and tRMS were both described by the Normal distribution for all channels, whereas NLOS measurements for tmean and tRMS were Nakagami and Weibull distributed, respectively. For the corridor measurements, LOS for tmean and tRMS were either Nakagami or normally distributed for all channels, with NLOS measurements for tmean and tRMS being Nakagami and normally distributed, respectively. This work also shows that achievable diversity gain was influenced by both mutual coupling and cross-correlation co-efficients. Although the best diversity gains were 1.8 dB for three-channel selective diversity combining, the authors present recommendations for improving these results. © The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2013.