Tensor-Based Joint Channel Estimation for Multi-Way Massive MIMO Hybrid Relay Systems

Recently, research on the design of relay structure and optimal precoding matrix in massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relay systems has been proposed in many works assuming that partial or all of the channel state information (CSI) is known. However, in the practical communication systems, the CSI is unknown and needs to be estimated. In particular, channel estimation is more difficult when the relay adopts a hybrid precoding structure. In this paper, we propose an efficient channel estimation scheme based on Tucker-2 tensor model for a multi-way massive MIMO hybrid relay system. The proposed algorithm provides all the CSI involved in the communication links at each user end. Compared with traditional channel estimation algorithms, the proposed algorithm has better estimation performance and requires few iterations to achieve convergence. In addition, we derive the analytical expression of the Cramér-Rao lower bound (CRB) for reference. Simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed Tucker-2-based channel estimation approach.