Characterization of the Indoor Multiantenna Body-to-Body Radio Channel

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the wideband body-to-body radio channel with multiple antennas at both ends based on a time-domain radio channel measurement campaign. Four single-element transmitters and eight quad-element receivers were mounted on three test people. Both directional and omnidirectional antennas have been investigated. A comparison between electromagnetic antenna simulations and the measurements shows that the multipath environment reduces the body losses effectively. Channel characterizations in terms of path loss, body shadowing, small-scale fading, and spatial correlation have been derived. Small path-loss exponents (< 2.0) are observed in the investigated environments. Considerable power loss due to body blockage makes the body shadowing a prominent factor in the short-range body-to-body communications. Distributed antenna selection diversity is presented to mitigate the body shadowing. A 5-dB diversity gain in the average received power at the mean and 10% outage levels have been identified based on the measurements with two distributed antennas mounted on the transmitter and receiver person and without channel-state information feedback to the transmitter.