Performance factors for space-time trellis codes in block fading channels

We propose the performance factors for space-time trellis codes (STTC) in block fading channels (BFC). The proposed performance factors are simpler than the conventional ones and good for the various situations: a short fading block length for a high signal-to-noise noise ratio (SNR) and a low SNR. They are inverse proportion to the coding gain. Moreover, based on the proposed performance factor, we propose a new STTC that outperforms the conventional STTC when the required SNR is low. For some STTC and the proposed STTC, we compute the values of the performance factors. From the computer simulation, we show the effectiveness of the proposed performance factors and the proposed STTC.