Computer Sciences and Information Technology
Title : | Development of Dense Deployable Massive MIMO antenna system for 5G wireless communications with reduced correlation mutual coupling |
Area of research : | Computer Sciences and Information Technology, Engineering Sciences |
Focus area : | 5G wireless communication |
Principal Investigator : | Prof. Sriram Kumar Damodaran, National Institute of Technology (NIT) Tiruchirappalli |
Timeline Start Year : | 2019 |
Contact info : | srk@nitt.edu |
Details
Executive Summary : | The next-generation wireless communications demand still higher data rates than the present scenario. To serve that need one of the possible techniques which are believed (by top telecommunications organizations like IEEE) to work is the Massive MIMO. As it is well known that the MIMO technique is well proved with its incorporations in 4G, to further increase the data rates per hertz (carrier carrying ability) it is realized that the number of antennas could be increased by ten folds to hundred folds than MIMO. But, the problem with a greater number of antennas within a smaller space is that it could increase the mutual coupling in between the elements of the system and thus cause a great increment in the correlation coefficient which further disturbs the independence of wireless channel seen by each and every antenna element. Very few configurations of Massive MIMO were reported till now in the literature which has proved the workability of the technique but the problem with all these techniques is the inability of addressing the ineffective space utilization of the Massive MIMO system without having a compromise on the reduction of correlation. If the space is utilized in an efficient manner, a still number of antennas could be accommodated into the available space so that the maximum achievable Data rate limit could be enhanced. Nature-inspired configurations could be used for reducing the correlation and mutual coupling among the antenna elements which could simultaneously enable the entire system to be small with dense deployment. It could be observed from the plants and trees that they orient their leaves such that the overall surface area getting exposed to sunlight could be maximum to receive the maximum energy within a smaller space they occupied. A similar thing could be observed from the petals of a flower which teaches us best about dense deployment. Using these kinds of configurations into Massive MIMO to reduce inefficient space utilization is the key idea of this project proposal. In order to implement a Massive MIMO system, investigators need to have two things. Configuration (placement) of elements and the design of the element. The size and shape of each antenna element are based on how much bandwidth it is expected to have and on the resonance frequency which they want to operate and the gain. All the parameters of the antenna have to be optimized in such a way that it could provide sufficient gain and bandwidth with a radiation pattern of the required shape. After that, the whole system has to be optimized for the required correlation coefficient and diversity by following the nature-inspired configuration. After the successful design, a number of antennas will be fabricated and assembled over a mechanical supporting structure which is designed according to configuration. After that, the prototype would be tested for its radiation characteristics to confirm its correlation performance. That would complete the project. |
Co-PI: | Dr Gunavathi Nagarajan, National Institute of Technology (NIT) Tiruchirappalli, Dr Rao Hanumantha Patnam, Scientist, Society for Applied Microwave Electronics Engineering Research, Tamil Nadu, Prof. Vasudevan K, Cochin University of Science and Technology, Kochi |
Total Budget (INR): | 51,73,520 |
Organizations involved