Near-Field MMSE Channel Estimation for THz RIS-aided Communications with Electromagnetic Interference

TL;DR

This paper proposes a near-field MMSE channel estimation method for THz RIS-assisted communications considering electromagnetic interference, demonstrating significant error reduction over existing approaches.

Contribution

It introduces a novel near-field MMSE estimator accounting for electromagnetic interference and optimizes RIS configuration using an alternating gradient descent method.

Findings

The proposed estimator outperforms existing methods in normalized mean-square error.

Leveraging near-field channel statistics improves estimation accuracy in THz RIS systems.

Electromagnetic interference significantly impacts channel estimation and must be considered.

Abstract

This letter investigates the channel estimation problem in THz wireless communications where a RIS is employed to assist wireless transmission between different devices. Unlike existing studies, we consider a novel scenario where specific devices are all located in the radiative NF region of the RIS. Meanwhile, we also account for the impact on channel estimation of the random electromagnetic interference occurring at the RIS location. A linear minimum mean-square error estimator is employed, where the estimation error is fully determined by the RIS configuration. Optimizing the RIS involves solving a non-convex problem, which is addressed using an alternating optimization approach based on the diagonally scaled gradient descent algorithm. Numerical results in the THz band highlight the importance of leveraging NF channel statistics over far-field approximations and demonstrate that the proposed estimator achieves substantial improvements in normalized mean-square error compared to existing methods.