Communication receivers based on Markov models of the fading channel

The problem researched is the comparison of different finite-state Markov channel (FSMC) models used to approximate the Rayleigh fading channel. The criterion used to compare the Markov models is the error performance of receivers based on the FSMC, where the sufficient statistics are obtained from the Jakes-Clarke (1974) fading channel. The FSMC receivers perform joint maximum a posteriori (MAP) sequence detection and channel estimation using the Viterbi algorithm. Receiver outputs of bit decision and channel estimation error are used as the measure of comparison between various models and a well-developed reference receiver. For this research 1^st and 2^nd order models were implemented. Simulation results suggest that there can be a significant improvement in receiver performance when the receiver is based on a 2^nd order model over a 1^st order model. Likewise, an improvement in performance is observed when the number of Markov states is increased.