Extracting fine multipath detail from measured data at 5.8 GHz

In the past, frequency domain channel measurements have been analysed using the inverse Fourier transform (IFT) to yield the time domain response of the channel. However, this technique cannot generally extract fine multipath detail (both magnitude and delay) present in the measured frequency domain data. The relatively low multipath resolution available from the IFT makes it very difficult to validate precise deterministic multipath propagation models, such as ray tracing. We discuss how the matrix pencil method (MPM) can be used to extract fine multipath detail from frequency domain data measured experimentally. The multipath detail estimated using both the IFT and the MPM, are compared with that produced by a ray tracing model. Excellent agreement is seen in the comparison with the MPM estimate.