editorial radio wave propagation and wireless channel...

Hindawi Publishing CorporationInternational Journal of Antennas and PropagationVolume 2013, Article ID 835160, 3 pageshttp://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/835160

EditorialRadio Wave Propagation and Wireless Channel Modeling

Ai Bo,1 Thomas Kürner,2 César Briso Rodríguez,3 and Hsiao-Chun Wu4

1 State Key Laboratory of Rail Traffic Control and Safety, Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing 100044, China2 Technische Universitat Braunschweig, Braunschweig 38106, Germany3Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Madrid 28031, Spain4 Louisiana State University, LA 70803, USA

Correspondence should be addressed to Ai Bo; [email protected]

Received 25 November 2012; Accepted 25 November 2012

Copyright © 2013 Ai Bo et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, whichpermits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Mechanisms about radio wave propagation are the basis forwireless channel modeling. Typical wireless channel modelsfor typical scenarios are of great importance to the physicallayer techniques such as synchronization, channel estima-tion, and equalization. Nowadays, many channel modelsconcerned with either large-scale modeling and small-scalefast fading models have been established. However, withthe development of some new techniques such as mul-tiuser MIMO systems, vehicle-to-vehicle technique, wirelessrelay technique, and short-distance or short-range technique,novel wireless channel models should be developed to caterfor these new applications. As for this special issue, wecordially invite some researchers to contribute papers thatwill stimulate the continuing efforts to understand the mech-anisms about radio wave propagations and wireless channelmodels under variant scenarios. This special issue providesthe state-of-the-art research in mobile wireless channels.

As we know, scene partitioning is the premise and basisfor wireless channel modeling. The paper titled “Radio wavepropagation scene partitioning for high-speed rails” discussesthe scene partitioning for high-speed rail (HSR) scenarios.Based on the measurements along HSR lines with 300 km/hoperation speed in China, the authors partitioned the HSRscene into twelve scenarios. Further work based on theoret-ical analysis of radio wave propagation mechanisms, such asreflection and diffraction, may lead to develop the standardof radio wave propagation scene partitioning for HSR.

The paper “Quantification of scenario distance withingeneric WINNER channel model” deals with the topic on thescenario comparisons on the basis of the fundamental theorythat a generic WINNER model uses the same set of parame-ters for representing different scenarios. It approximates the

WINNER scenarios with multivariate normal distributionsand then uses the mean Kullback-Leibler divergence toquantify the divergence. The results show that the WINNERscenario groups (A, B, C, D) or propagation classes (LoS,NLoS) do not necessarily ensureminimum separation withinthe groups/classes. The computation of the divergence of theactual measurements and WINNER scenarios confirms thatthe parameters of the C2 scenario in WINNER series area proper reference for a large variety of urban macrocellenvironments.

The paper “Fading analysis for the high speed railwayviaduct and terrain cutting scenarios” provides a good under-standing of fading characteristics in HSR environment basedon the measurements taken in both high-speed viaductand terrain cutting scenarios using track side base stations.Kolmogorov-Smirnov (K-S) test has been first introducedin the statistical analysis to find out the most appropriatemodel for the small-scale fading envelope. Some importantconclusions are drawn: though both Rice and Nakagamidistributions provide a good fit to the first-order envelopedata in both scenarios, only the Rice model generally fitsthe second-order statistics data accurately. For the viaductscenario, higher Rice K factor can be observed. The changetendency of the K factor as a function of distance in the twoscenarios is completely different.

The paper “Propagation mechanism modeling in the near-region of arbitrary cross-sectional tunnels” talks about themodeling of the propagation mechanisms and their dividingpoint in the near-region of arbitrary cross-sectional tunnels.By conjunctively employing the propagation theory and thethree-dimensional solid geometry, it presents a generalmodelfor the dividing point between two propagationmechanisms.

2 International Journal of Antennas and Propagation

Furthermore, the general dividing point model is specifiedin rectangular, circular, and arched tunnels, respectively. Fivegroups of measurements are used to justify the model indifferent tunnels at different frequencies. The results couldhelp to deepen the insight into the propagation mechanismsin tunnels.

A key characteristic of train-to-train (T2T) communi-cation, a recently proposed novel technique for HSR, is toavoid accidents conducted among trains without any aid ofinfrastructure. The paper “A novel train-to-train communica-tion model design based on multihop in high-speed railway”provides a novel T2T communication model in a physicallayer based on multihop and cooperation technique. Themechanism of this model lies in the idea that a sourcetrain uses trains on other tracks as relays to transmit signalsto destination train on the same track. The paper titled“Outage analysis of train-to-train communication model overNakagami-m channel in high-speed railway” analyzes the end-to-end outage performance of T2T communication model inHSR over independent identical and nonidentical Nakagami-m channels. It presents a novel closed form for the sum ofsquared independent Nakagami-m variates and then derivesan expression for the outage probability of the identicaland nonidentical Nakagami-m channels. Numerical analysisindicates that the derived analytical results are reasonable andthe outage performance is better over Nakagami-m channelin HSR scenarios.

The above-mentioned papers are for HSR communica-tion wireless channel models. There are also some papersdealing with the channel models for satellites, ships, humanbodies, and vehicle-to-vehicle communications.

The paper “State modeling of the land mobile propagationchannel with multiple satellites” evaluates a novel approachfor multisatellite state modeling: the Master-Slave approachand its corresponding realizationmethodnamedConditionalAssembling Method. The primary concept is that slavesatellites are modeled according to an existing master statesequence, whereas the correlation between multiple slavesis omitted. For modeling two satellites (one master and oneslave), the “Conditional Assembling Method” enables anaccurate resimulation of the correlation coefficient betweenthe satellites, the single satellite state probabilities, andthe combined state probabilities of master and slave. Theprobability of the “all bad-” state resulting from master-slave is compared with an analytically estimated “all bad-”state probability frommeasurements. Master-slave has a highprobability error in case of a high correlation between theslave satellites. Furthermore, a master satellite with a highelevation provides a lower probability error compared to amaster with low elevation.

The improvement of maritime radio links often requiresan increase of emitted power or receiver sensitivity. Anotherway is to replace the poor antenna gains of traditionalsurface ship whips by novel antenna structures with directiveproperties. The paper “Impact of ship motions on maritimeradio links” developed a tool for modeling the impact ofship motions on the antenna structures. The tool includes adeterministic two-raymodel for radio-wave propagation overthe sea surface.

The paper “Statistical modeling of ultrawideband body-centric wireless channels considering room volume” presentsthe results of a statistical modeling of on-body ultrawide-band (UWB) radio channels for wireless body area network(WBAN) applications. A measured delay profile can bedivided into two domains: in the first domain there is eithera direct (for line of sight) or diffracted (for nonline of sight)wave which is dependent on the propagation distance alongthe perimeter of the body, but essentially unrelated to roomvolume; and the second domain has multipath componentsthat are dominant and dependent on room volume. Thefirst domain was modeled with a conventional power decaylaw model and the second domain with a modified Saleh-Valenzuela model considering the room volume. Realizationsof the impulse responses are presented based on the compos-ite model and compared with the measured average powerdelay profiles.

Thepaper titled “On the statistical properties of Nakagami-hoyt vehicle-to-vehicle fading channel under nonisotropic scat-tering” argues the statistical properties of vehicle-to-vehicleNakagami-Hoyt (Nakagami-q) channel model under non-isotropic condition. The spatial-time correlation function(STCF), the power spectral density (PSD), squared timeautocorrelation function (SQCF), level crossing rate (LCR),and the average duration of fade (ADF) of the Nakagami-Hoyt channel have been derived under the assumptionthat both the transmitter and receiver are nonstationarywith nonomnidirectional antennas. A simulator utilizing theinverse-fast-fourier-transform- (IFFT-) based computationmethod is designed for the model.

The paper “NECOP propagation experiment: rain-ratedistributions observations and prediction model comparisons”talks about the empirical distribution functions for the eval-uation of rain-rate based on the observed data.The empiricaldistribution functions were compared with cumulative dis-tribution functions generated using four different rain-ratedistribution models. It is found that although each of themodels shows similar qualitative features at lower exceedanceof time, the characteristics at higher time percentages showquantitative difference from the experimental data except theimproved version of Moupfouma model. The results furthershow that the rain-fall rate and the microwave propagationcharacteristics in the observed region are out of accord withInternational Telecommunication Union predictions. Thisinformation is vital for predicting rain fading cumulativeprobability distributions.

The paper “Influence of training set selection in artificialneural network-based propagation path loss predictions” uti-lizes the artificial neural networks (ANNs) and ray-tracingtechnique for predicting the received power/path loss inboth outdoor and indoor links. A complete description ofthe process for creating and training an ANN-based modelis presented with special emphasis on the training process.The optimum selection of the training set is discussed. Aquantitative analysis based on results from two narrowbandmeasurement campaigns is also presented.

The following fours papers are related with multi-inputand multioutput (MIMO) techniques. The paper “A tradeoff

International Journal of Antennas and Propagation 3

between rich multipath and high receive power in MIMOcapacity” presents a discussion of richmultipath (inNLOS) orsignal-to-noise ratio (SNR) (usually in LOS) effects onMIMOchannel capacity. It is investigated by performing simulationsusing simple circle scatterer andWINNER II channel model.The simulation results show that these two factors behavedifferently as the channel conditions vary.When the scatterernumber in channel is low, the high receive SNR is moreimportant than capacity. The multipath richness will get theupper bound when the scatterer number is beyond a certainthreshold. However, the channel capacity will not changemuch as the scatterers continue to increase.

The paper “Construction and capacity analysis of high-rank LoS MIMO channels in high speed railway scenarios”talks about the validity of the maximum capacity criterionapplied to realize high-rank LoS MIMO channels for HSRscenarios. Performance is evaluated by ergodic capacity.Numerical results demonstrate that, by simply adjustingantenna spacing according to the maximum capacity crite-rion, significant capacity gains are achievable. Two proposalsare presented to reconfigure antenna arrays so as to maxi-mize LoS MIMO capacity in the HSR scenarios. The paper“Geometry-based stochastic modeling for MIMO channel inhigh-speed mobile scenario” discusses the geometry-basedstochastic channel models for the terrain cutting, suburb,and urban scenarios in HSR. The space time correlationfunctions in analytical form are obtained in suburb andurban scenarios. The comparisons of the space correlationcharacteristics under three scenarios are made.

The paper “Performance evaluation of closed-loop spatialmultiplexing codebook based on indoor MIMO channel mea-surement” discusses closed-loop MIMO technique standard-ized for long-term evolution (LTE) system. Based on thewideband MIMO channel measurement in a typical indoorscenario, capacity loss (CL) of the limited size codebookrelative to perfect precoding is studied in two extremechannel conditions. The results show that current codebookdesign for single-layer transmission is nearly capacity losslessand the CL will increase with the number of transmittedlayers. Furthermore, the capacity improvement of bettercodebook selection criterions is very limited compared to CL.To survey the effect of frequency domain channel variation onMIMO-OFDM system, a function is defined to measure thefluctuation levels of the key channelmetrics within a subbandand to reveal the inherent relationship between them.

Ai BoThomas Kurner

Cesar Briso RodrıguezHsiao-Chun Wu

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