Asymptotically tight bound on SER of MIMO zero-forcing receivers with correlated fading

Analysis of the symbol error rate (SER) for linear MIMO receivers is a challenging task in the presence of spatial fading correlation at the antenna arrays, especially at the receiver side. In this paper, for the first time we present a tight bound on the SER of MIMO zero-forcing receivers in correlated Rayleigh fading environments. The novel bound is based on a moment generating function (MGF) approach and requires the evaluation of a single integral with finite integration limits only. It is tight in the SNR range of practical interest and exact at high SNR, thereby allowing for a concise characterization of the influence of fading correlation in terms of an asymptotic SNR shift. Specifically, the SNR penalty due to correlation at the receiver can be expressed simply via elementary symmetric functions of the eigenvalues of the receive correlation matrix. Furthermore, the novel bound can serve as a valuable tool for an efficient analysis of multiuser smart antenna systems deploying e.g. optimum combining.