Power Allocation Strategy for MIMO System Based

on Beam-Nulling
Mabruk Gheryani, Zhiyuan Wu, and Yousef R. Shayan
Concordia University, Department of Electrical Engineering
Montreal, Quebec, H4G 2W1, Canada
email: (m gherya, zy wu, yshayan)@ece.concordia.ca
Abstract In this paper, we propose a scheme called beamnulling using the same feedback bandwidth as beamforming but
with higher capacity. In the beam-nulling scheme, the eigenvector
of the weakest subchannel is fed back and then signals are sent
over a generated subspace orthogonal to the weakest subchannel.
Hence, the scheme can achieve high capacity. The capacities of
water-filling, equal power, beamforming and beam-nulling are
compared through theoretical analysis and numerical results.
It is shown that at medium signal-to-noise ratio, beam-nulling
approaches the optimal water-filling scheme.

I. I NTRODUCTION
It has been recognized that adaptive techniques, proposed
for single-input-single-output (SISO) channels [1] [2], can also
be applied to improve MIMO channel capacity [3]- [5]. The
ideal scenario in adaptive schemes is that the transmitter has
full knowledge of channel state information (CSI) which is
fed back from the receiver. With such a perfect CSI feedback,
the original MIMO channel can be converted to multiple
uncoupled SISO channels via singular value decomposition
(SVD) at the transmitter and the receiver [3]. In other words,
the original MIMO channel can be decomposed into several orthogonal spatial subchannels with various propagation gains.
To achieve better performance, various strategies to allocate
constrained power to these subchannels can be implemented
depending on the availability of CSI at the transmitter [6]- [8].
If the transmitter has full knowledge about channel matrix,
i.e., full CSI, the so-called water-filling (WF) principle is
performed on each spatial subchannel to maximize the channel
capacity [3]. This scheme is optimal in this case. Various WFbased schemes have been proposed, such as [9]- [12]. For
the WF-based scheme, the feedback bandwidth for the full
CSI grows with respect to the number of transmit and receive
antennas and the performance is often very sensitive to channel
estimation errors.
Various beamforming techniques for MIMO channels have
also been investigated extensively, which can mitigate the
above disadvantages. In an adaptive beamforming scheme,
complex weights of the transmit antennas are fed back from
the receiver. If only one eigenvector can be fed back, eigenbeamforming [7] is optimal. The eigen-beamforming scheme
only applies to the strongest spatial subchannel but can achieve
full diversity and high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) [7]. Also, in
practice, the eigen-beamforming scheme has to cooperate with
the other adaptive parameters to improve performance or/and

data rate, such as constellation and coding rate. There are also
other beamforming schemes based on various criteria, such as
[7]- [14]. Note that the conventional beamforming is optimal
in terms of maximizing the SNR at the receiver. However,
it is sub-optimal from a MIMO capacity point of view, since
only one data stream, instead of parallel streams, is transmitted
through the MIMO channel [15].
In this paper, we propose a new technique called beamnulling (BN). This scheme uses the same feedback bandwidth
as beamforming. That is, only one eigenvector is fed back
to the transmitter. The beam-nulling transmitter is informed
with the weakest spatial subchannel and then sends signals
over a generated spatial subspace orthogonal to the weakest
subchannel. Note that both transmitter and receiver should
know how to generate the same spatial subspace. Hence,
the loss of channel capacity as compared to the optimal
water-filling scheme can be reduced. Although the transmitted
symbols are precoded according to the feedback, the beamnulling scheme is different from the other existing precoding
schemes with limited feedback channel, which are independent
of the instantaneous channel but the optimal precode depends
on the instantaneous channel [16] [17].
II. C HANNEL M ODEL
In this study, the channel is assumed to be a Rayleigh flat
fading channel with Nt transmit and Nr (Nr Nt ) receive
antennas. We denote the complex gain from transmit antenna
n to receiver antenna m by hmn and collect them to form
an Nr Nt channel matrix H = [hmn ]. The channel is
known perfectly at the receiver. The entries in H are assumed
to be independently identically distributed (i.i.d.) symmetrical
complex Gaussian random variables with zero mean and unit
variance.
The symbol vector at the Nt transmit antennas is denoted by
x = [x1 , x2 , . . . , xNt ]T . According to information theory [5],
the optimal distribution of the transmitted symbols is Gaussian.
Thus, the elements {xi } of x are assumed to be i.i.d. Gaussian
variables with zero mean and unit variance, i.e., E(xi ) = 0
and E|xi |2 = 1.
The singular-value decomposition of H can be written as
H = UVH

(1)

where U is an Nr Nr unitary matrix, is an Nr Nt matrix

with singular values {i } on the diagonal and zeros off the

Ant-1

diagonal, and V is an Nt Nt unitary matrix. For convenience,

we assume 1 2 . . . Nt , U = [u1 u2 . . . uNr ] and
V = [v1 v2 . . . vNt ]. {ui } and vi are column vectors.
From equation (1), the original channel can be considered as
consisting of uncoupled parallel subchannels. Each subchannel
corresponds to a singular value of H. In the following context,
the subchannel is also referred to as spatial subchannel. For
instance, one spatial subchannel corresponds to i , ui and
{vi }.

g1,1
x1

Ant-1

g1
gNt,1

gNt-1

y~1

Ant-Nr

g1,Nt-1
xNt-1

Ant-Nt
gNt,Nt-1

Generate

Channel
Estimation

vNt-1

III. P OWER A LLOCATION A MONG S PATIAL S UBCHANNELS

We assume that the total transmitted power is constrained
to P . Given the power constraint, different power allocation
among spatial subchannels can affect the channel capacity
tremendously. Depending on power allocation strategy among
spatial subchannels, four schemes are presented which have
equal power, water-filling, eigen-beamforming, and the new
power allocation which is beam-nulling.
If the transmitter has no knowledge about the channel,
the most judicious strategy is to allocate the power to each
transmit antenna equally, i.e., equal power. In this case, the
received signals can be written as
r
P
y=
Hx + z
(2)
Nt
z is the additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) vector with
i.i.d. symmetrical complex Gaussian elements of zero mean
and variance z2 . The associated ergodic channel capacity can
be written as [3]
"N

#
t
X
2

Ceq = E
(3)
log 1 +

Nt i
i=1
where E[] denotes expectation with respect to H and = P2
z
denotes SNR. If the transmitter has full knowledge about the
channel, the most judicious strategy is to allocate the power
to each spatial subchannel by water-filling principle [3]. In
water-filling scheme, the received signals can be written as
p
yi = Pi i xi + zi
(4)
where

Nt
P
i=1

Pi = P as a constraint and zi is the AWGN

Fig. 1.

beam-nulling scheme.

where z1 is the additive white Gaussian noise vector with

i.i.d. symmetrical complex Gaussian elements of zero mean
and variance z2 . The associated ergodic channel capacity can
be written as

Cbf = E log 1 + 21
(7)
The eigen-beamforming scheme can save feedback bandwidth and is optimized in terms of SNR [18]. However,
since only one spatial subchannel is considered, this scheme
suffers from loss of channel capacity [15], especially when the
number of antennas grows.
A. Beam-Nulling
Inspired by the eigen-beamforming scheme, we propose a
new beamforming-like scheme called beam-nulling (BN).
This scheme uses the same feedback bandwidth as beamforming. That is, only one eigenvector is fed back to the transmitter.
Unlike the eigen-beamforming scheme in which only the best
spatial subchannel is considered, in the beam-nulling scheme,
only the worst spatial subchannel is discarded. Hence, the loss
of channel capacity can be reduced as compared to the optimal
water-filling scheme.
In this scheme as shown in Fig. 1, the eigenvector associated
with the minimum singular value from the transmitter side, i.e.,
vNt , is fed back to the transmitter. A subspace orthogonal to
the weakest spatial channel is constructed so that the following
condition is satisfied.
H vNt = 0

(8)

random variable with zero mean and z2 variance. Following

the method of Lagrange multipliers, Pi can be found [3] and
the total ergodic channel capacity is
"N
#

t
X
P
i
2
(5)
Cwf = E
log 1 + 2 i
z
i=1

The Nt (Nt 1) matrix = [g1 g2 . . . gNt 1 ] spans the

subspace. Note that the method to construct the subspace
should also be known to the receiver.
An example to construct the orthogonal subspace is presented as follows. We construct an Nt Nt matrix

To save feedback bandwidth, beamforming can be considered. For the MIMO model, the optimal beamforming is called
eigen-beamforming [7] [18], or simply beamforming. We
assume one symbol x1 , is transmitted. At the receiver, the
received vector can be written as

(6)
y1 = P Hv1 x1 + z1

where I0 = [I(Nt 1)(Nt 1) 0(Nt 1)1 ]T . Applying QR decomposition to A, we have

A = [vNt I0 ]

A = [vNt ] R

(9)

(10)

where R is an upper triangular matrix with the (1,1)-th entry

equal to 1. is the subspace orthogonal to vNt .

At the transmitter, Nt 1 symbols denoted as x0 are

transmitted over the orthogonal subspace . The received
signals at the receiver can be written as
r
P
0
y =
Hx0 + z0
(11)
Nt 1
where z0 is additive white Gaussian noise vector with i.i.d.
symmetrical complex Gaussian elements of zero mean and
variance z2 .
Substituting (1) into (11) and multiplying y0 by UH , we
have
r

P
B
e=
y

x0 + e
z
(12)
0T
Nt 1
where e
z is additive white Gaussian noise vector with i.i.d.
symmetrical complex Gaussian elements of zero mean and
variance z2 . With the condition in (8),

B
VH =
(13)
0T
where

B=

v1H g1
v2H g1
..
.
H
vN
g
t 1 1

v1H g2
..
.
..
.
...

...
...
..
.
...

v1H gNt 1
..
.
..
.
H
vN
g
t 1 Nt 1

Ceq

Cbf

Cbn

"N
t
X

#
1
E
t
+ N
2
i=1
"
# i
1
E
+ 12
"N 1 1
#
t
X
1
E
+ Nt 1
2
i=1

(14)

B is an (Nt 1) (Nt 1) unitary matrix. As can be seen

from (12), the available spatial channels are Nt 1. Since the
weakest spatial subchannel is nulled in this scheme, power
can be allocated equally among the other Nt 1 subchannels.
Equation (12) can be rewritten as
r
P
0
e =
y
0 Bx0 + e
z0
(15)
Nt 1
e 0 and e
where y
z0 are column vectors with the first
e and e
(Nr 1) elements of y
z, respectively, and 0 =
diag[1 , 2 , . . . , (Nt 1) ]. From (15), the associated ergodic
channel capacity can be found as
"N 1

#
t
X

2
log 1 +
Cbn = E

(16)
Nt 1 i
i=1
As can be seen, the beam-nulling scheme only needs one
eigenvector to be fed back. However, since only the worst
spatial subchannel is discarded, this scheme increases channel
capacity significantly as compared to the conventional beamforming scheme.
IV. C OMPARISONS A MONG THE F OUR S CHEMES
In this section, we compare the new proposed beam-nulling
scheme with the other schemes. Water-filling is the optimal
solution among the four schemes for any SNR.

(17)
(18)
(19)

The differential will also be referred to as slope. Since

the second order differentials are negative, the above ergodic
capacities are concave and monotonically increasing with
respect to .
For the case of Nt = 2, beamforming and beam-nulling
have the same capacity for any as can be seen from equations
of capacity and slope. If 0, i.e., at low SNR, it can be
easily found that
Cbf
Cbn
Ceq

, 0

Differentiating the above ergodic capacities with respect to

respectively, we have

(20)

If , i.e., at high SNR, it can be easily found that

Cbn
Cbf
Ceq

(21)

Note that Cbf = Cbn = Ceq = 0 when = 0 or minus

bn
infinity in dB. Hence, at medium SNR, C
has the largest

value compared to bf and eq . Therefore, for low, medium

and high SNRs, beamforming, beam-nulling and equal power
has largest capacity, respectively.
In Fig. 2, capacities of water-filling, beamforming, beamnulling and equal power are compared over 5 5 Rayleigh
fading channels, respectively. Note that since SNR is measured
in dB, the curves become convex. In these figures, EQ stands
for equal power, WF stands for water-filling, BF stands
for beamforming and BN stands for beam-nulling. As can
be seen, the water-filling has the best capacity at any SNR
region. The other schemes perform differently at different
SNR regions. At low SNR, the beamforming is the closest
to the optimal water-filling, e.g., the SNR region below 3.5
dB for 5 5 fading channel. Note that at low SNR, the waterfilling scheme may only allocate power to one or two spatial
subchannels. At medium SNR, the proposed beam-nulling is
the closest to the optimal water-filling, e.g., the SNR region
from 3.5 dB to 16 dB for 5 5 fading channel. The beamnulling scheme only discards the weakest spatial subchannel
and allocates power to the other spatial subchannels. As can
be seen from the numerical results, the beam-nulling scheme
performs better than the other schemes in this case. Note that
at high SNR, the equal power scheme will converge with the
water-filling scheme.

5x5
12
EQ
WF
BF
BN

Capacity (bit/s/Hz)

10

Fig. 2.

8
SNR (dB)

10

12

14

16

5 5 Rayleigh fading channel.

V. C ONCLUSIONS
Based on the concept of spatial subchannels and inspired
by the beamforming scheme, we proposed a novel scheme
called beam-nulling. Using the same feedback bandwidth as
beamforming, the new scheme exploits all spatial subchannels
except the weakest one and thus achieves significant high
capacity near the optimal water-filling scheme at medium
signal-to-noise ratio. The comparison showed that at low
signal-to-noise ratio, beamforming is the closest to the optimal
water-filling, at medium signal-to-noise ratio, beam-nulling is
the closest to the optimal solution, and at high signal-to-noise
ratio, equal power is the closest to the optimal solution.
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