Closed loop power control with space diversity to improve performance of low elevation angle users in HAPs-CDMA communication channel

This paper proposes variable step closed loop power control algorithm combined with space diversity to improve the performance of High Altitude Platforms (HAPs) communication at low elevation angle using Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA). In this contribution, we first develop HAPs channel model which is derived from experimental measurement. From our experiment, we found HAPs channel characteristic can be modeled as a Ricean distribution because the presence of line of sight path. Different elevation angle resulting different K factor value. This value is then used in Signal to Interference Ratio (SIR) based closed loop power control evaluation. The variable step algorithm is simulated under various elevation angles with different speed of mobile user. The performance is presented in terms of user elevation angle, user speed, step size and space diversity order. We found that the performance of variable step closed-loop power control less effective at low elevation angle. However our simulation shows that space diversity is able to improve the performance of closed loop power control for HAPs channel at low elevation angle.