Performance Analysis of MIMO-MRC in Double-Correlated Rayleigh Environments

TLDR

MIMO transmit beamforming with MRC receivers operates in Rayleigh fading environments with both transmit and receive spatial correlation. The study presents exact expressions for the output SNR pdf and system outage probability. These expressions are derived from closed‑form pdf and CDF of the maximum eigenvalue of double‑correlated complex Wishart matrices, with exact symbol‑error rate formulas for two‑antenna systems, and validated by Monte Carlo simulations. The new expressions prove that MIMO‑MRC achieves the maximum available spatial diversity order and demonstrate the effect of spatial correlation.

Abstract

We consider multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) transmit beamforming systems with maximum ratio combining (MRC) receivers. The operating environment is Rayleigh fading with both transmit and receive spatial correlation. We present exact expressions for the probability density function (pdf) of the output signal-to-noise ratio, as well as the system outage probability. The results are based on explicit closed-form expressions which we derive for the pdf and cumulative distribution function of the maximum eigenvalue of double-correlated complex Wishart matrices. For systems with two antennas at either the transmitter or the receiver, we also derive exact closed-form expressions for the symbol-error rate. The new expressions are used to prove that MIMO-MRC achieves the maximum available spatial diversity order, and to demonstrate the effect of spatial correlation. The analysis is validated through comparison with Monte Carlo simulations