On the Impact of Antenna Topologies for Massive MIMO Systems

TL;DR

This paper derives approximate spatial correlation expressions for cylindrical and URA antenna arrays in massive MIMO systems, analyzing their convergence properties and SINR performance.

Contribution

It introduces new approximate correlation models based on measured AOD distributions and compares the convergence behavior of different antenna topologies in massive MIMO.

Findings

URA and cylindrical arrays have distinct correlation characteristics.

Convergence rates of SINR differ between antenna topologies.

Approximate models effectively predict massive MIMO channel behavior.

Abstract

Approximate expressions for the spatial correlation of cylindrical and uniform rectangular arrays (URA) are derived using measured distributions of angles of departure (AOD) for both the azimuth and zenith domains. We examine massive multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) convergence properties of the correlated channels by considering a number of convergence metrics. The per-user matched filter (MF) signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) performance and convergence rate, to respective limiting values, of the two antenna topologies is also explored.