A novel detection scheme for space-time block coded systems with imperfect CSI and CFO estimation

In this paper we propose a new detection scheme for space-time block coded (STBC) systems over a flat Rayleigh fading channel. The new detector is derived for receivers having unknown channel state information (CSI) and carrier frequency offset (CFO). The proposed detector is based on a maximal ratio combiner (MRC) which optimizes the output in terms of maximum signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) along with a maximum likelihood (ML) detector. Theoretical analysis and simulation results show the importance and advantages of proposed scheme for different modulation schemes and in the presence of multiple estimation error variances. The proposed decoder outperforms the conventional decoder in terms of bit error rate (BER).