MIMO channel capacity measurement in the presence of spatial clusters using a fading emulator

This paper presents a radio frequency (RF) controlled spatial fading emulator for the evaluation of a handset MIMO antenna. The RF-controlled fading emulator can control RF signals directly in the spatial domain to produce an accurate radio propagation channel model, which includes the uniform and non-uniform angular power spectra (APS) in the horizontal plane. Fading correlation and MIMO channel capacities of a quasi-dipole array, in the case of up to three spatial clusters, are measured by using the emulator. From agreement between the measured data and theoretical values, the effectiveness of the emulator was confirmed.