Diversity and Multiplexing Technologies by 3D Beams in Polarized Massive MIMO Systems

Abstract

Massive multiple input, multiple output (M-MIMO) technologies have been proposed to scale up data rates reaching gigabits per second in the forthcoming 5G mobile communications systems. However, one of crucial constraints is a dimension in space to implement the M-MIMO. To cope with the space constraint and to utilize more flexibility in 3D beamforming (3D-BF), we propose antenna polarization in M-MIMO systems. In this paper, we design a polarized M-MIMO (PM-MIMO) system associated with 3D-BF applications, where the system architectures for diversity and multiplexing technologies achieved by polarized 3D beams are provided. Different from the conventional 3D-BF achieved by planar M-MIMO technology to control the downtilted beam in a vertical domain, the proposed PM-MIMO realizes 3D-BF via the linear combination of polarized beams. In addition, an effective array selection scheme is proposed to optimize the beam-width and to enhance system performance by the exploration of diversity and multiplexing gains; and a blind channel estimation (BCE) approach is also proposed to avoid pilot contamination in PM-MIMO. Based on the Long Term Evolution-Advanced (LTE-A) specification, the simulation results finally confirm the validity of our proposals.