Design considerations for hardware implementation of space-time codes

Hybrid multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) space-time codes combine spatial multiplexing with diversity gain to achieve both high spectral efficiency and link reliability. In this work, we present two decoding algorithms, one based on ordered, successive interference cancellation (OSIC) and the other on maximum likelihood (ML), and analyze their performance and complexity towards a hardware implementation. We use a correlated MIMO channel model and explore the impact of correlation on code performance and decoder complexity. We show that two space-time codes, LD STBC-VBLAST and double-space time transmit diversity (DSTTD) codes, are attractive candidates for implementation, each with different advantages.