Performance of space-time block codes with transmit antenna selection in Nakagami-m fading channels

In this paper, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems employing orthogonal space-time block codes (STBCs) with transmit antenna selection (TAS) are examined for uncorrelated flat Nakagami-m fading channels. Exact symbol error rate (SER) expressions for M-ary modulation techniques are derived by using the moment generating function (MGF)-based analysis method. In the SER analysis, the receiver antennas are assumed to use maximal ratio combining (MRC) whereas a subset of transmit antennas that maximizes the instantaneous received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is selected for STBC transmission. The derived SER results for different numbers of receive and transmit antennas are validated by Monte Carlo simulations and it is shown that the investigated systems achieve full diversity orders at high SNRs.