Performance analysis of rate-adaptive modulation with antenna selection in multiuser MIMO system

The performance analysis of multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system with rate-adaptive modulation and antenna selection over Rayleigh fading channels is presented. By means of exact expression of bit error rate (BER), the suboptimal switching thresholds (ST) of fading gain subject to a target BER constraint are derived. It is shown that this suboptimal ST are very close to the optimal ST, and is more accurate than the conventional ST based on approximate BER expression. By the ST, we obtain exact closed-form expressions of the spectrum efficiency (SE) and average BER. Moreover, a tightly approximate BER is derived to simplify the calculation of exact BER, which has more accuracy than the existing approximate BER. Simulation results for SE and BER are in good agreement with the derived theoretical expressions. The results show that the multiuser MIMO with adaptive modulation can provide better SE than the single user counterpart, and the system SE using suboptimal ST is also higher than that using conventional ST.