Analysis of the Alamouti STBC MIMO System With Spatial Division Multiplexing Over the Rayleigh Fading Channel

The Alamouti space-time block coding (STBC) multiple input multiple output (MIMO) system with spatial division multiplexing (SDM) is different from the pure SDM MIMO system in transmitting groups of Alamouti STBC symbols. Because of the Alamouti STBC, the zero-forcing with successive interference cancellation (ZF-SIC) detector for this MIMO system also detects one group of Alamouti STBC symbols in its one iteration. Previous analytical studies on this MIMO system were concentrated on the scenario of only four transmit antennas and did not take full advantage of the group-wise properties of the equivalent channel matrix due to Alamouti STBC. To deliver indepth analysis of this MIMO system with arbitrary number of transmit antennas, the ZF-SIC detection of the groups of Alamouti STBC symbols over the independent identically distributed Rayleigh fading channel is analyzed. Exact average block error probability of detecting all groups of Alamotui STBC symbols and its high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) approximation are computed. Also, exact average group error probability of detecting each group of Alamotui STBC symbols and its high SNR approximation are computed. These analytical results are shown to agree with the simulation results.