Nakagami-m approximation to the sum of M non-identical independent Nakagami-m variates

A Nakagami-m approximate distribution to the sum of M non-identical independent Nakagami-m variates is derived. Comparisons between exact and approximate sum distributions show excellent agreement. This new approach finds applicability in important communications issues such as equal-gain combining, signal detection, linear equalisers, outage probability, intersymbol interference and phase jitter.