Exploiting Channel Reciprocity in Massive MIMO
Description
Massive MIMO takes MU-MIMO to the next level by scaling up the number of antennas at the base station by an order of magnitude, providing additional degrees of freedom in the channel. These additional degrees of freedom can be used to design more simple and scalable signal processing algorithms and help focusing energy into small regions of space and thus reducing interference.
Together with its partner IABG, EURECOM is currently developing a massive MIMO platform based on its established OpenAirInterface platform. The platform will feature a 64 element antenna array from IABG and a rack of 16 ExpressMIMO2 cards, each able to control 4 RF chains. The goal of the platform is to validate the feasibility of massive MIMO for real-time communication using the OpenAirInterface LTE software modem.
Challenges: Massive MIMO relies to a great extent on the exploitation of channel reciprocity to gain channel state information at the transmitter (CSIT). However, while the physical radio channel is reciprocal, the effects of the radio frequency circuits is not and must be calibrated. Such calibration procedures exist, but they have never been tested in real-life massive MIMO scenarios.
Other challenges of massive MIMO include
• Pilot contamination
• Channel characterization
• Distributed signal processing
• Impact on a system level and heterogeneous operation with small cells
Expected results: The goal of this PhD thesis is to advance the state of the art in massive MIMO systems with a strong focus on practical feasibility of such systems. The successful applicant is expected to make use of the OpenAirInterface platform as much as possible, for example by conducting and analyzing measurements and by prototyping and evaluating some of the algorithms developed during his thesis.
The thesis should answer the question if massive MIMO using channel reciprocity is really feasible, and what gains can be achieved in practice.
Requirements
We are looking for a highly motivated person with a master degree in electrical engineering or applied mathematics (signal processing or communications engineering) with strong mathematical and communication skills, keen to operate in a multidisciplinary team. The candidate should further have good programming skills in C. The candidate should be fluent in English.
Application
Screening of applications will begin immediately, and the search will continue until the position is filled. Applicants should send, to the address below (i) a one page statement of research interests and motivation, (ii) your CV and (iii) contact details for three referees (preferably one from your PhD or most recent research supervisor).
Applications should be submitted by e-mail to secretariat [at] eurecom [dot] fr with the reference: PhD_CM_FK_09_2013
Additional information
The PhD thesis is funded by the laboratory of excellence UCN@Sophia (https://ucnlab.eu/) and is therefore jointly supervised by Ass. Prof. Florian Kaltenberger from EURECOM and Prof. Luc Deneire from the I3S lab of the Nice Sophia Antipolis University (UNS).
The main workplace will be EURECOM, the doctoral school will be Ecole Doctorale STIC.
