Reconfigurable Hybrid Beamforming for Dual-Polarized mmWave MIMO Channels

Abstract

A reconfigurable hybrid beamforming (HBF) system is proposed to flexibly exploit the channel diversities and antenna array directivity in millimeter wave channels. Sub-arrays of antennas can be reconfigured in the proposed HBF system to adjust the spatial and polarization diversities and the array gains according to the channel environments and the relative locations between the transmitter and the receiver. Based on the reconfigurable HBF system, a training procedure is also proposed for the transmitter and the receiver to learn the best operating mode according to channel quality and characteristics. Compared to a fixed HBF system, the reconfigurable HBF system has 3 to 10 dB power gains in channel capacity in various simulated channel conditions.