A Multiple Input - Multiple Output Channel Model for Simulation of TX- and
=-Diversity Wireless Systems
Matthias Stege, Jens Jelitto, Marcus Bronzel, Gerhard Fettweis
Mannesmann Mobilfunk Chair for Mobile Communications Systems,
Dresden University of Technology, Germany
E-mail: stege@ifn.et.tu-dresden.de
Abstract
Space-time receivers for wireless communication systems
offer the possibility to have both TIX- and RX-antennas.
For a realistic simulation of such systems, a multiple input
multiple output (MIMO) spatial channel model is required
which reasonably characterizes the space- and time-variant
effects of the mobile radio channel. This paper describes a
space-time vector channel model with realisticfading sim-
ulationfor different scenarios. Mutual correlation between
the fading coefficientsis considered. This allows an estima-
tion of the diversity gain, that can be achieved with space-
time receivers in direrent scenarios.
1 Introduction
In order to analyze the performance of new space-time con-
cepts such as adaptive antennas, space-time processing and
-coding techniques, an adequate space-time channel model
is essential. Current vector channel models represent the
spatial fading characteristicsonly at the receiver (RX) 141.
Although this channel models are sufficient for simulation
of space-time concepts at the receiver, they are not directly
applicable for scenarios, where space-time concepts are ap-
plied at the transmitter (TX). For the performance analysis
of TX-diversity concepts, the correlation between the wire-
less channel from each TX-to each RX-antenna is essen-
tial. A realistic model of the correlation between fading co-
efficients at different TX-antennas is therfore necessary to
evaluate the performance of TX-diversity concepts such as
space-time coding 1121 for differentpropagation scenarios.
The presented MIMO-channel model allows a common
simulation of TX as well as =-space-time concepts. The
MIMO-channel model is based on the assumption, that
there are are few dominant spatially well separated reflec-
0-7803-6507-0/00/$10.00 @ZOO0 IEEE
tors in the far-field. For each dominant reflector one sig-
nificant multipath is assumed. This path consists of a large
number of incoming waves which result from the structure
of local scatterers in vinicity of the transmitter and receiver.
Since the relative delays of these waves are small, they can-
not be resolved by the receiver. In case of any movement
in the scenario the superposition of the waves results in a
space-time fading process. Independent fading is assumed
for each significant multipath p with a specific time delay
TP.
After the introduction a MIMO-signal model in Section 2
including a discrete time matrix formulation, the MIMO-
channel characteristics and their modeling are described in
Section 3 in more detail. In Section 4 the results of the
space-time fading models are compared with theoretical as-
sumptions.
2 SignalMOdel
A space-time channel with MT"transmit and MR' receive
antennas is considered. In general, the signals of the TX-
antennas are transmitted over MT" different single input
multiple output-channels (SIMO-channel). The vector
represents the communication channel from transmit an-
tenna m to every receive antenna. The received signal vec-
tor follows from a superposition of signals transmitted over
MT"antennas:
MT"-l 00
+i(t) + n(t); (2)
where i(t) represents the interference and n(t) the noise
vector.
833 VTC 2000
After sampling with a sampling period of Ts= +Tsym the The complex path coefficients c ~ (n)
, ~are, defined
~ as:
oversampled stream of transmitted symbols from the m-th
TX-antenna sk (t) is defined as follows (The oversampling cp,m,r(n> = Pp * ~ p ( n.>Pp,m,r(n) (8)
factor q is assumed to be a non-negative integer.):
with the average pathloss Pp,~ ~ (describes
n ) the slow fad-
ing (shadowing) and @p,m,r(n)the space-time fast fading.

k=-m

Oversampling of the transmitted signal is done by inserting

(7- 1) zeros between each symbol s m ( k ) . The discrete
time representation of (2) follows:
UT=-1 CO

x(n~s)= s t , ( l ~ shm(nTs,
) (n - 1 ) ~ s )
m=O I=-m
+
+i(nTs) n(nTs) (4)

The sampling period Tsis dropped in all following discrete

time representations for notational convinience.
Following the characteristics of the channel impulse re-
sponse hm (n, n - I ) for a multipath environment are de-
scribed in more detail. The transmitted signal arrives at the
receiver with some delay TO. Additional to the fist path,
there are echos coming from reflections, diffraction or scat-
tering of the signal at these objects. Significant multipaths
appear from dominant remote reflectors with a significant
distance to the receiver. The number of such significant
multipaths (P) depends strongly on the propagation sce-
nario. Usually the number of significant multipath are as-
< <
sumed to be in the range of 1 P 12 [2]. The ability of
a receiver to resolve multipath components depends on the
bandwidth of the communicationsystem.
Figure 1 shows the channel impulse response I L ~ , ~ ( ~ , TPath
) loss exponents 2 < n < 6 are possible depending on
of the communicationchannel between %-antenna m and the propagation scenario to be considered.
RX-antenna T . The discrete time representation of the chan-
nel vector h(n,n - I ) follows from (1): Alternatively, characteristic power-delay profiles may be
used, which are defined for ITU channel models.
The channel vector is defined as the sum of P convolutions
n ) path p , TX-
of the channel coefficients ~ p , ~ , ~for( the
antenna m and =-antenna T with the pulse shaping filter
response g ( T ) of the communicationsystem.
P-1
hm,r(n, 71 - = .
~ p , m , r ( n ) g(n - 1 - 7p,m,r)
p=o
The delay T~,,,,,~consist of the path delay T~ and the propa-
gation delays across the TX- and =-antenna arrays:
rp,m,r = ~p + A;> + Af:m-
Figure 1. Channel impulse response h(t,.r) for
the multipath channel from TX-antenna m and RX-
antenna T
It is assumed that T~ >> and therefore the aver-
age path loss Pp = d mis constant for all TX-and
=-antennas. The mean power of each multipath compo-
nent depends on the overall propagation delay T~ and is de-
fined as [lo]
pL(~p)[dBl= Pref 10nlog(~p/~ref). (9) +
Due to movement there are fading effects, that affect the
instantaneousreceived power of a path p. They can be clas-
sifies as slow and fast fading. Slow fading (shadowing) is
often neglected for bit level simulations of digital commu-
nication system since a long simulation time would be con-
sumed to achieve statistic at reliable results for this fading
process. Therefore, slow fading is assumed to be constant
over the simulation time for the bit level channel model.
(6)
Paths that arrive with small delays to the significant multi-
paths result from the local scattering structure in the vicinity
of the transmitter, dominant reflectors or receiver. In case of
any movement this local scattering results in a space-time-
variant fading processes. The space-time fading model is
(7) described in Section 3.

0-7803-6507-0/00/$10.00 @ZOO0 IEEE 834 VTC 2000

In matrix formulation (4) can be expressed as:
x(n) = H ( n ) s'(n) + i(n) + n(n). (10)
The [ ( N .&IT=)x M"'] - dimensional channel mamx con-
tains of &IT' SIMO-channels H,(n),
H(n) = [Hi(n) H z ( ~ .).* HMT=(n)]7 (11)
where H,(n) defines the channel through which the signal
is transmitted from TX-antenna m to all RX-antennas:
H m ( n ) = [h,(n,O) hm(n,1) . .. h,(n,N - l)].
(12)
The signal vector consists of N subsequent samples of the
signals from each of the MT*TX-antennas:
d ( n )=[si(.) ... si(. - N + 1) ..,
Furthermore, i(n) and n(n)contain interference and noise
in a similar manner.
The fading characteristicof the MIMO-channel and the mu-
tual correlation of the space-time-fadingprocesses is impor-
tant for the receiver performance in a specific scenario. In
Section 3 the spatial characteristics are described in more
detail, since they determine the characteristicsof the space-
time-fading.
3 MIMO Channel Model
For each significant multipath componentp the angle of ar-
rival (AOA) c$pand the angle of departure (AOD) q$= are
defined with respect to the array normal of the according
antenna array and the position of a dominant reflector. The
orientation of the TX-array and the RX-array with respect
to the line of sight (LOS)is described by 4
": and 4 t X ,
respectively (Figure 2). This model does not consider ele-
vation angles.
Due to local scatteringthere is some angular spread up(4F)
for each significant multipath p , which results in replica of
the signal having almost the same delay rp,but arise from
different AOA's 4;;:
A similar angular spread up(@;=)
can be defined for local
scattering at the transmitter.
0-7803-6507-0/00/$10.00 @ZOO0 IEEE
Remote Scatterer p
P-
e Mk
RX-Antennas
(i.e. MT)
Figure 2. Geometry of the scattering scenario.
Since the characteristic AOA and AOD of a path depend
on the position of the dominant reflector they are somehow
associated with the delay of that path. It is reasonable to
expect that significant muhipath components which anive
within a short delay interval tend to be clustered and have
therefore a similar AOA's and AOD's. One approach which
takes this into account is to define a certain dominant spa-
tial reflector distribution and to derive the spatial channel
characteristicsfrom this distribution, e.g. [5]. For simplic-
ity, these models use the single bounce assumption, which
means, that each multipath component is created by a spec-
ular reflection of the wavefronts at the reflecting object.
Only uniform linear arrays (ULA) are considered in this pa-
per. The array propagation vector defines the spatial re-
sponse of an antenna array. It is assumed that the RX-
antennas are within the far-field of the TX-antennas. There-
fore, the plane wave assumption holds for all RX-antennas.
The propagation of a plane wave representing the path p
impinging on the antenna array causes a time delay A:,=,. at
different antenna elements. This small time delay of the ar-
rival of the wavefronts between different antennas results in
a phase-shift @ r , p at these RX-antennas:
@$ = @,.(q5:) = 27rA:y,.i. (15)
The delay A;: at RX-antenna T compared to the first an-
tenna is defined as:
where dR" is the distance between two adjacent antennas
and X is the carrier wavelength of the communicationssys-
tem.
83 5 VTC 2000
The array propagationvector arcontains these phase shifts
with respect to the first antenna for a certain path p . For a
uniform linear array with antenna spacing P this vector
ap"' can be expressed as:
and describes the spatial response of the array to a wave-
form impinging from direction 4 r .
The same principle also applies to the TX-antenna array
where the array response vector defines the relative phase
shifts of the signals arriving from different antennas of the
TX-antenna array at a dominant reflector:
follows from the relative large distance between the domi-
nant reflector and the receiver. It causes a temporal- , but
no spatial-fading at the receiver. However, local scatter-
ing in vicinity of the receiver (RX2 in Figure 3) results in
larger angular spreads, since the distance between the RX-
antennas and the local scatterers is small. Therefore, local
scattering in the vicinity of the receiver results in a space-
time fading process.

with:

RX1
for the m-th %-antenna and the p t h path.
Figure 3. Different local scattering scenarios at the
Due to the limited time resolution not all incoming echos
receiver
of the signal can be separated. In case of any movement,
the path length to each local scatterer changes, resulting in
a time varying complex fading process. For a given velocity With a variation of the distribution of 4; different spatial
U ,the maximum frequency shift is fd = fcv/c for a carrier scenarios can be simulated. Further the effects of the an-
frequency fc. The fading process & , m , r ( t ) of the p t h path tenna displacement on the correlation can be studied with
between the m-th TX-antenna and the r-th RX-antenna is a this model. It is therefore suitable for simulating different
superpositionof L incoming local scattering wavefronts: space-time receiver concepts such as diversity as well as
beamforming approaches.
1 L-l
=- a m ( 4 ~ ;a>r ( 4 z >up,[ ej2*fdtcos(G)
JI; [=O
(20) 4 Simulation Results
= ~ ~ , ~ejbp*-,r(t)
, ~ ( t ) (21)
4.1 SIMO-Space-TimeFading
Each signal arriving from these local scatterers undergoes
an attenuation vP,l which is assumed to result from a ran-
dom process with uv = 1. The AOD is often modeled as To study the effects of space-time-fading,first a single TX-
a uniform random distribution 0 5 4; 5 2n which yields antenna (SIMO-channel) is considered. The correlation of
the well-known Jakes-Spectrum [3]. the fading coefficients at the RX-array is a measure for the
spatial fading characteristic of the SIMO-channel and de-
While ~ ~ , ~ ,and + ( ~t $) ; ; ~ , ~give
( t )rise to the typical
pends on the displacement P of the antennas and the an-
temporal correlation characteristic of the fast fading pro-
gular distribution. The spatial fading correlation of path p
cess, the two array propagation phase shifts ~~(4;;) and
~~(4;;) define the spatial characteristics of the fading pro-
cess. L-1

Significant multipaths resulting from largely spaced domi- = a(4;;>aH(4;;) (22)

nat reflectors have different resolvable delays rp. The fad-
ing process for each significant multipath is assumed to be
independent.
Wavefronts that result from local scattering only around the
transmitter arrive from a distinct angle of arrival q
5r hav-
ing only a small angular spread (RX1 in Figure 3). This
1=0
can be estimated for a uniform distribution of 4; within
4; = 4y fARzas given in [ 6 ] .Figure 4 and 5 shows the
correlation of the fading signals at two antenna elements
as a function of their separation P /A for different AOA's
( 4 r ) and angular spreads. Obviously small angular spreads

0-7803-6507-0/00/$10.00 02OOO IEEE 836 VTC 2000


Spatial Sensor Separation d/X
Figure 4. Spatial correlation for different angular
spreads and a AOA=OO
AR=results in a high spatial correlation.
High correlation of the fading coefficients at different RX-
antennas can be observed in uplink urban scenarios with
small angular spreads, which is the case if the base station is
located at the roof tops and the mobile moves on the street
level. In this case all incoming L local reflections arrive
from approximately the same AOA (4:; = q5?, V I ) . The
fading coefficients at different RX-antennas differ only by
a phase shift that is defined by the array propagation vector
a(47) (17) determined by the distinct AOA of the multi-
path.
Significant multipaths resulting from largely spaced domi-
nat reflectors have different resolvable delays T ~ The
. fad-
ing process for each significant multipath is assumed to be
independent.
For downlink urban scenarios,the local angular spread at
the RX-antennas is higher than for the uplink, because of the
small distance of local scatterers to the antennas. Therefore,
fading at the antennas becomes less correlated due to the
increased angular spread. This holds even for small antenna
displacements P .
4.2 MIMO-Space-TimeFading
For a MIMO-channel, the spatial fading correlation be-
tween signals from different =-antennas has to be mod-
eled as well, This Correlation depend on the distribution of
the AOD's 4:; and results in mutual correlated fading pro-
02000 IEEE
0-77803-6507-0/00/$10.00
1.
.. .. .. .. ..
!
... ... .. . :.
4 . . .
Figure 5. Spatial correlation for different angular
spreads and a AOA=6O0
for each of the MT"TX-antennas.
cesses /3p,m,r(t)
L-1
Similar to the spatial correlation at the RX-array, a high cor-
relation can be observed for low local angular spreads at the
transmitter and vice versus.
The angular spreads ap(47)and U, (4:*) due to local scat-
tering in vicinity of the TX- and RX-antennas are assumed
to be independent. This is the case, if the antenna heights
are not the same which results in a different spatial scenario
at the transmitter and receiver (eg. the angular spread at a
base station antenna on roof top level can be assumed to be
much smaller than for an antenna operating on street level
with local scattering from many surrounding objects)
Hence, a scenario with considerable space diversity at the
RX-aswell as TX-antennas would be a base station below
rooftop and a mobile operating in a bad urban environment.
In this case the RX-and the TX-spatial correlations are both
low and diversity can be gained using both TX- and RX-
diversity concepts. Spatially independent fading processes
can be observed at the antenna array even when the antennas
are spaced only a few wavelengthsor less.
Measurements suggest that it might be reasonably to as-
sume a Laplacian rather than a uniform distribution for lo-
cal AOA's in uplink scenarios [7, g]. The temporal fading
characteristic depends on the number of local scatterers L
837 VTC 2000
 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5
antenna displacement d / A
Figure 6. MIMO-Fading Correlation between a sig-
nal received at different RX-antennas
Remote reflector
-----<
4 characteristic as the theory.
4
Tx
local scanering local scanering
Figure 7. MIMO fading scenario
as well as on the distribution of 4;. The widely used as-
sumption of a uniform distribution which results in the well-
known Jakes-Spectrum [1, 31 is achieved in the limit of an
infinite number of local scatters and a uniform distribution
of 4;:
This theoretical assumption is reasonable for simulations,
since it defines a worst case scenario for the space-time fad-
ing that might occur in a real environment.
Figure 6 and 8 shows the correlation of simulated space-
time fading processes for 8 RX-antennas and 4 TX-antennas
compared to theoretical results from [6]. In this example
a uniform distribution of L = 100 local scatterers with
4gy0 = 20°,AT= = 50°, 4Fo; = 50°,AT= = 180°
was assumed. The simulated correlation matches almost
0-7803-6507-0/00/$10.00 02000 IEEE
4
Figure 8. MIMO-Fading Correlation between signal
transmitted from different TX-antennas
the theoretical results. The small differences arrise from the
finite number of local scatterers L and the limited obser-
vation time. This shows that the modeling of the MIMO-
fading process (20) have approximatly the same correlation
5 Conclusion
Rx
In this paper a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)
channel model has been derived. Such a model is essen-
tial for realistic bit-level simulations of communication sys-
tems that use space-time-codes and other concepts that ex-
ploit spatial diversity. The main advantage of the presented
model is the realistic space-time fading simulation at the
receiver as we11 as the transmitter. In the past, the per-
formance of space-time codes and other =-diversity tech-
niques were simulated for uncorrelated fading. With this
channel model a more realistic simulation can be made,
which it allows investigations of the actually achievable di-
versity gains using antenna arrays for a wide range of sce-
narios.
Future work will consider the statistical description of
spatial scatterer distributions for the significant multipaths
components and the local scattering. Furthermore, the dif-
ference of the spatial scatterer distributionsfor different an-
tenna heights needs to be examined in more detail. Mea-
surements should be made to comply the results.
838 VTC 2000
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