published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The increasing demand for high-mobility and high data rate in wireless communications results in constraints and problems in the limited radio spectrum, multipath fading, and delay spread. The multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system has been generally considered as one of the key technologies for the next generation wireless communication systems. MIMO systems which utilize multiple antennas in both the transmit side and the receive side can overcome the abovementioned challenges since they are able to increase the channel capacity and the spectrum usage efficiency without the need for additional channel bandwidth. The detection algorithm is a big bottleneck in MIMO systems. Generally, it is expected to fulfill two main goals simultaneously: low computational complexity and good error rate performance. However, the existing detection algorithms are either too complicated or suffering from very bad error-rate performance. The purpose of this thesis is to comprehensively investigate the detection algorithms of MIMO systems, and based on that, to develop new methods which can reduce the computational complexity while retain good system performance. Firstly, the background and the principle of MIMO systems and the previous work on the MIMO decoding algorithms conducted by other researchers are thoroughly reviewed. Secondly, the geometrical analysis of the signal detection is investigated, and a geometric decoding algorithm which can offer the optimum BLER performance is proposed. Thirdly, the semidefinite relaxation (SDR) detection algorithms are extended to high-order modulation MIMO systems, and a novel SDR detector for 256-QAM constellations is proposed. The theoretical analysis on the tightness and the complexity are conducted. It demonstrates that the proposed SDR detector can offer better BLER performance, while its complexity is in between those of its two counterparts. Fourthly, we combine the SDR detection algorithms with the sphere decoding. This is helpful for reducing the computational complexity of the traditional sphere decoding since shorter initial radius of the hyper sphere can be obtained. Finally, the novel lattice-reduction-aided SDR detectors are proposed. They can provide near-optimum error rate performance and achieve the full diversity gain with very little computational complexity added compared with the stand-alone SDR detectors. / published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The best MPhil thesis in the Faculties of Dentistry, Engineering, Medicine and Science (University of Hong Kong), Li Ka Shing Prize,2010-11. / published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Master / Master of Philosophy

It has been envisioned that in the near future, wireless ad hoc networks would populate various application fields, ranging from disaster relief, environmental monitoring, surveillance, to medical applications, the observation of chemical and biological processes and community mesh networks. The decentralized and self-organizing nature of wireless ad hoc networks makes distributed algorithms fit very well in these networks, which however pose great challenges to the algorithm designers as they try to achieve optimal efficiency in communications. In this thesis, I develop a set of distributed algorithms addressing these challenges and solving some fundamental communication problems in wireless ad hoc networks. Communications in wireless ad hoc networks happen on a shared medium, and consequently are subject to interference. The first part of the thesis focuses on disseminating information on multiple-access channels while avoiding collisions. For both single-channel and multi-channel networks, the complexity of information dissemination is investigated, and nearly optimal distributed algorithms are proposed. The second part of the thesis focuses on designing efficient distributed algorithms for some fundamental problems under the physical Signal-to-Interference-plus-Noise-Ratio (SINR) interference model. The SINR model defines global fading interference with which the success of a signal reception depends on all simultaneous transmissions. Compared with graph based models, the SINR model reflects the fading and cumulative nature of radio signals. Hence, the SINR model represents the physical reality more precisely. However, the global nature of the SINR model makes the analysis of distributed algorithms much more challenging. Two types of fundamental problems are addressed in this part. The first type is closely related to communication coordination, including the wireless link scheduling problem and the node coloring problem. The second type of problems are about basic communication primitives, including the local broadcasting problem and the multiple-message broadcast problem. I investigate the complexity of these fundamental problems under the SINR interference model, and present efficient or optimal distributed algorithms. In the third part of the thesis, I propose a general interference model that can include commonly adopted interference models as special cases, and study whether efficient distributed algorithms can still be designed and analyzed in such a general model. Specifically, the affectance model is proposed in this part, which depicts the relative interference (affectance) on communication links caused by transmitting nodes. Both graph based models and the SINR model can be transformed into the affectance model. Under this general model, distributed algorithms with worst-case guarantees for the local broadcasting problem are presented. I also show how to make use of the developed techniques to get nearly optimal algorithms under the graph based model and the SINR model. / published_or_final_version / Computer Science / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The thesis report presents the designs of compact planar ultra-wideband (UWB) antennas for wireless devices applications. Three main designs of UWB antennas are studied, namely, single UWB antennas, UWB multiple-input-multiple-out(MIMO)antennas, and transparent UWB antennas on the screens of mobile phones. For single UWB antennas, the designs of two compact planar monopole antennas with compact sizes of 26×28 mm2and 30×39.3mm2are presented. The UWB operations of the antennas are achieved using a ground slot under the feed line, offsetting the feed line and the radiator from the middle of the ground plane and smoothly transforming the feed line. Simulation and measurement show that the two antennas can achieve an ultra-wide bandwidth with approximately omnidirectional patterns. A deep notch-band in5.1-5.85 GHz is created in one of the UWB antennas by employing two pairs of meander lines (MLs), one pair being close to the feed line and the other pair along the upper edge of the ground plane. At the notch frequency, the simulated efficiency is only 4%. Three compact UWB-MIMO antennas with very compact sizes of 26×40 〖mm〗^2, 21×38 〖mm〗^2, and 22×36 〖mm〗^2 are designed. Each of them is designed using two UWB antenna elements perpendicularly or symmetrically placed. Different techniques such as using ground stubs besides the radiators, cutting inclined slots on the ground, and adding a T-shaped protruding from ground are proposed to lower mutual coupling between the two antenna elements. One of the antennas is designed to generate a notched band in 5.15-5.85 GHz using two ground strips. Simulation and measurement results show that these antennas can cover the entire UWB of 3.1-10.6GHz with mutual coupling of less than -15 dB, and envelope correlation coefficient of less than 0.1. An UWB antenna is designed using a transparent conductive film for applications on mobile phone screens. The effects of a finger touching the screen are studied. Results show that, with the radiator on the bottom side of the screen and a thin film with a thickness of 0.05 mm on the top side to separate the finger and the antenna, the effects of the finger can be minimized. In measurement of monopole antennas with small ground planes, due to the feeding cable used, there are always discrepancies between the simulated and measured results in radiation patterns, efficiencies, and gains at lower frequencies. To verify that the discrepancies in the results of these studies are indeed due to the feeding cable used in measurement, the models of the feeding cables are developed and used for simulation. Results show that, by using the cable model, the simulated and measured results in radiation patterns, efficiencies, and gains agree very well. / published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

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With frequency selective fading, the SNRs of each sub-carrier would vary over the time and frequency. It would then cause fluctuations of the effective SNR. As the decision of MeS in LA is based on the effective SNR, the study of the statistical characterization of effective SNR over frequency selective fading channels would be very important, This problem forms the basis of investigation in this thesis. The methodology used in this thesis is generally divided into two parts. The first part is to investigate the method in obtaining the distribution of EESM over frequency selective fading channels. Such approach will be very helpful for the second part of the work which is to obtain the exact distribution of the EESM effective SNR for a specified fading model. In this case, Nakagami-m fading model is used. The choice of this model is based due to its simplicity and experimental consistency. One of the important features of the distribution is that the SNR of a signal under Nakagami fading is gamma distributed. Thus, in performance evaluation involving Nakagami fading, one can often rely on established results (in the statistics literature) of the gamma distribution. An important special case of the Nakagami distribution is the Rayleigh distribution, which arises in the situation of where the line-of-sight (LOS) component between the transmitter and the receiver is absent, i.e., when all of the received power stems from scattered components. The corresponding distribution for the SNR is the exponential distribution. The research in this thesis represents an effort to provide a statistical characterization of EESM effective SNR which has not appeared in any existing literatures. The goals of this thesis is to Characterize the statistics of EESM effective SNR over frequency selective channels. Obtain the distribution of EESM effective SNR over correlated Nakagami-m fading channels. Theoretically analyze the performance (Le. average SNR, outage probability and Symbol Error Rate (SER) etc.) of EESM over correlated Nakagami-m fading channels. Provide simple approximations to the proposed analytical results. Try to find extension and application of the results.

M. Tech. Electrical Engineering. / The objective of this research is to model and simulate a high capacity and secure wireless communication protocol for personal area network. The high capacity of the system is achieved using Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) technology while the security is ensured by using near field magnetic induction. The application targeted by this research confine to the military domain, where the confidentiality of the data exchanged is of prime importance. Computer simulations of MIMO application in near field magnetic induction communication were done and used to analyse the channel capacity Improvement. The outcome of the research contributes to the existing research in the near field magnetic induction communication by introducing a high capacity channel in near field magnetic induction communications.