Distributed base station, communication system, and signal transmission method thereof

• US 8,248,993 B2
• Filed: 10/12/2006
• Issued: 08/21/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/18/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Alcatel-Lucent SA (Nokia Corporation)
• Inventors: Cai, Liyu
• Primary Examiner(s): FARAGALLA, MICHAEL A
• Application Number:
  US11/546,315
• Publication Number:
  US 20070093273A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,140 Days
• Field of Search: 370/328, 370/342, 370/329, 370/338, 455/82, 4554561-4566, 375/260, 375/267
• US Class Current: 370/328
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/022 Site diversity; Macro-diversity using two or more spaced independent antennas H04B7/04
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/0452 Multi-user MIMO systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/0669 using different channel coding between antennas space-time coding H04L1/0618
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/068 using space frequency diversity space-frequency coding H04L1/0606

Abstract

The present invention discloses a distributed base station serving mobile stations, which comprises multiple antenna-RF processing units and a central processing unit remotely connected with said multiple antenna-RF processing units. Each of the antenna-RF processing units has an antenna array formed by multiple antennas. Said central processing unit comprises: an MIMO coding unit for MIMO coding of data of each of the mobile stations so that data of each of the mobile stations generates multi-path data symbols; a beam-forming unit for multiplying each path data symbol of the multi-path data symbols of each of the mobile stations by a weighted coefficient vector corresponding to this path data symbol, to obtain beam-forming data of each path data symbol of each of the mobile stations; and an overlapping unit for, with respect to each antenna in said antenna-RF processing units, overlapping beam-forming data of the respective mobile stations for this antenna and feeding the overlapped beam-forming data to this antenna for transmission. The present invention further discloses a communication system having the above distributed base station and the corresponding signal transmission method.

Claims

1. A distributed base station serving mobile stations, comprising:

a plurality of spatially diverse antenna-RF processing units remote from one another, each of the antenna-RF processing units having an antenna array formed by multiple antennas; and

a central processing unit remotely connected with said multiple antenna-RF processing units, each of the antenna RF processing units having an antenna array formed by multiple antennas, said central processing unit comprising;

a MIMO coding unit for MIMO coding of data of each of the mobile stations so that data of each of the mobile stations generates multi-path data symbols;

a baseband beam-forming unit for multiplying each path data symbol of the multipath data symbols of each of the mobile stations by a weighted coefficient vector corresponding to this path data symbol, to obtain beam-forming data of each path data symbol of each of the mobile stations; and

an overlapping unit for, with respect to each antenna in said antenna RF processing units, overlapping beam-forming data of the respective mobile stations for this antenna and feeding the overlapped beam-forming data to this antenna for transmission, wherein the overlapping unit of the baseband beam-forming unit multiplies each path data symbol of each given mobile station by only two weighted coefficient vectors corresponding to two selected antenna-RF processing units selected by the given mobile station to obtain beam-forming data of each path data symbol of each of the mobile stations.

2. The distributed base station according to claim 1, wherein the number of the multi-path data symbols generated by said MIMO coding unit is the same as the number of beams received by each of the mobile stations during signal reception.

3. The distributed base station according to claim 1, wherein beam-forming data of each path data symbol of said mobile station forms beams, which point to said mobile stations, on all antennas of the corresponding antenna RF processing unit.

4. The distributed base station according to claim 1, wherein a weighted coefficient vector of each of the mobile stations on each antenna of each of the antenna-RF processing unit is calculated using channel measurement and feedback information of the mobile stations and based on a criterion for reducing interference on other mobile stations.

5. The distributed base station according to claim 1, wherein said MIMO coding unit performs coding using Space Time Block Code or, Space Frequency Block Code or Spatial Reuse.

6. A communication system comprising:

a distributed base station according to claim 1 and multiple mobile stations, wherein beams which said distributed base station directionally transmits to each of the mobile stations via its antennas constitute an MIMO transmission system together with antennas of the corresponding mobile station.

12. The distributed base station of claim 1, wherein the central processing unit processes baseband signals.

13. The communication system of claim 6, wherein the central processing unit of the distributed base station processes baseband signals.

15. The distributed base station of claim 1, wherein beam-forming data of each path data symbol for each mobile station forms beams, which point to said mobile station, on antennas of only the antenna-RF processing units corresponding to said mobile station.

17. The distributed base station of claim 1, wherein the plurality of spatially diverse antenna-RF processing units are widely spaced from each other such that spatial correlation between two antennas selected by a given one of the mobile stations is very weak.

18. The communication system of claim 6, wherein the plurality of spatially diverse antenna-RF processing units are widely spaced from each other such that spatial correlation between two antennas selected by a given one of the mobile stations is very weak.

7. A method of signal transmission between a distributed base station and mobile stations, wherein said distributed base station comprises multiple antenna-RF processing units remote from one another and a central processing unit remotely connected with said multiple antenna-RF processing units, the method comprising the following steps:

an MIMO coding step for MIMO coding of data of said base station for each of the mobile stations to divide data of each of the mobile stations into multi-path data symbols;

a baseband beam-forming data obtaining step for multiplying each path data symbol of the multipath data symbols of each of the mobile stations by a weighted coefficient vector corresponding to this path data symbol to obtain beam-forming data of each path data symbol of each of the mobile stations, wherein the baseband beam-forming data obtaining step includes multiplying each path data symbol of each given mobile station by only two weighted coefficient vectors corresponding to two selected antenna-RF processing units selected by the given mobile station to obtain beam-forming data of each path data symbol of each of the mobile stations; and

an overlapping step for, with respect to each antenna in a plurality of spatially diverse remote antenna-RF processing units, overlapping beam-forming data of the respective mobile stations for this antenna and feeding the overlapped beam-forming data to this antenna for transmission.

8. The method of signal transmission according to claim 7, wherein the number of the multi-path data symbols generated in said MIMO coding step is the same as the number of beams received by each of the mobile stations during signal reception.

9. The method of signal transmission according to claim 7, wherein beam-forming data of each path data symbol of said mobile station forms beams, which point to said mobile stations, on all antennas of the corresponding antenna-RF processing unit.

10. The method of signal transmission according to claim 7, wherein a weighted coefficient vector of each of the mobile stations on each antenna of each of the antenna-RF processing unit is calculated using channel measurement and feedback information of the mobile stations and based on a criterion for reducing interference on other mobile stations.

11. The method of signal transmission according to claim 7, wherein said MIMO coding step performs coding using Space Time Block Code or, Space Frequency Block Code.

14. The method of claim 7, wherein the MIMO coding step, beam-forming data obtaining step and overlapping step are performed on baseband signals.

16. The method of claim 7, wherein beam-forming data of each path data symbol of said mobile station forms beams, which point to said mobile station, on antennas of only the corresponding antenna-RF processing unit.