Efficient large scale antenna selection by partial switching connectivity

In this work we analyze the benefits of low-complexity radio frequency (RF) switching matrices (SMs) for antenna selection (AS) in large scale antenna systems (LSAS). The reduced RF complexity and insertion losses (ILs) are attained by limiting the number of internal connections in the SM, at the expense of a limited flexibility in the AS. The results presented in this paper demonstrate that partially-connected (PC) SMs outperform conventional fully-flexible (FF) alternatives due to their reduced ILs, which are characterized in this work.