Compact formulas for the average error performance of noncoherent m-ary orthogonal signals over generalized rician, nakagami-m, and nakagami-q fading channels with diversity reception

This paper derives exact expressions for the average error performance of M-ary orthogonal signals with noncoherent equal-gain diversity combining over nonidentical generalized Rician, Nakagami-m, Nakagami-g, and implicitly Rayleigh fading channels. The assumption of generalized distributed fading envelopes implies that the received average signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) and/or the fading parameters can have arbitrary nonidentical values. The derived expressions are precisely given in terms of either one-fold integral or rapidly convergent infinite series, which can be readily evaluated numerically. In addition, they can be usefully used to study the impact of arbitrary correlation among diversity branches on the system average error performance.