Stochastic array antenna figures‐of‐merit for quality‐of‐service‐enhanced massive MIMO

Abstract

AbstractThis paper shows that the signal‐to‐interference‐plus‐noise ratio (SINR) at a base station (BS) equipped with an arbitrary physical array antenna can be expressed as a function of two fundamental, stochastic figure of merits (FoMs): (I) the instantaneous effective gain (IEG) and (II) the beamforming‐channel correlation (BCC). This result is achieved by applying a novel channel normalization approach using a reference array to preserve effects induced by the embedded element patterns of physical antenna elements. It is shown that both FoMs provide essential insights for quality‐of‐service (QoS)‐based array antenna design by investigating their statistics for BSs applying full‐digital (FD) zero forcing (ZF) beamforming. Various array designs are evaluated, and it is shown that arrays with higher IEGs and a reduced probability of low BCCs can increase the ergodic sum rate and reduce the need for scheduling.