On Some Design Issues of Space-Time Coded Multi-Antenna Systems

This paper concerns some design issues and tradeoffs of communication systems equipped with multiple transmit and receive antennas. The general space-time coding/modulation structure by Tarokh et al. (1999) is considered. Several design issues are investigated for this structure. The layered space-time architecture by Foschini (1996) is revisited as a special case of the general structure. It is also used to demonstrate the design and complexity tradeoffs of the system. Through intuitive and analytical explanations, as well as simulations, the design considerations for these space-time transmission structures and their contributions to the performance are shown.