MIMO Testbed for MU-MIMO Downlink Transmission

Multi-user multiple input multiple output (MU-MIMO) systems have attracted much attention as a technology that enhances the total system capacity by generating a virtual MIMO channel between a base station and multiple terminal stations. Extensive evaluations are still needed because there are many more system parameters inMU-MIMO than in single user (SU)-MIMO and the MU-MIMO performance in actual environments is still not well understood. This paper describes the features and effectiveness of a 16 × 16 MU-MIMO testbed in an actual indoor environment. Moreover, we propose a simple adaptive modulation scheme for MU-MIMO-OFDM transmission that employs a bit interleaver in the frequency and space domains. We evaluate the frequency efficiency by obtaining the bit error rate of this testbed in an actual indoor environment. We show that 16×4×4-user MU-MIMO transmission using the proposed modulation scheme achieves the frequency utilization of 870Mbps and 1Gbps (respective SNRs: 31 and 36 dB) with a 20-MHz bandwidth. key words: multiuser MIMO, adaptive modulation scheme, OFDM, eigenvalue, bit interleaver