MIMO: From Theory to Reality

Overview

Driven by the even growing demand of higher data rate with the scarce spectrum resource, the theoretical breakthrough has been made and demonstrated significant increase on channel capacity (spectral efficiency) over MIMO systems. The theoretical MIMO spectral efficiency is verified by MIMO channel measurements and trial systems. Two MIMO mechanisms are widely adopted: spatial multiplexing and space-time block coding (STBC). The MIMO techniques are specified in a variety of wireless standards: WiFi, WiMAX, HSPA+, LTE, and future 802.16m and LTE-advanced. After little more than 10 years, MIMO technology has become one of the major forces to enable mobile broadband communications.