Site-specific evaluation of a MIMO channel capacity for multi-antenna mobile terminals in proximity to a human hand

This paper presents a comprehensive evaluation on the Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) channel capacity performance of a coupling element -based multi-antenna structures on a mobile terminal at the 2000 MHz Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) frequency band with varying two significant hand effects; vertical position of hand along terminal chassis, and distance between hand palm and terminal chassis. The studied multi-antenna structures are analyzed with measured propagation channel specifically in a 2154 MHz outdoor microcellular environment. The results show that at the median MIMO capacity, a maximum reduction of 3.6 bit/s/Hz is observed when the hand palm is in close proximity to the multi-antenna mobile terminal, compared to that of in free space. The MIMO channel capacity reductions are significant when all multi-antenna elements are in close proximity to the hand palm, compared to when only index finger is in proximity to one of the elements.