Efficient Soft MIMO Detection Algorithms Based on
Differential Metrics
Wang-Yueh Chang and Ming-Xian Chang
Institute of Computer and Communication Engineering and Department of Electrical Engineering
National Cheng-Kung University Tainan, 70101, Taiwan
E-mail: q38014045@mail.ncku.edu.tw, mxchang@mail.ncku.edu.tw
Abstract—The multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) tech-
nology can make full use of spectrum and increase the com-
munication throughput. In the coded MIMO system, the main
challenge of soft detection is to efficiently generate the log-
likelihood ratios (LLR) values for channel decoder. The exact
maximum a posteriori (MAP) probability detection can guarantee
the optimal performance, but its realization is difficult due to
its enormous complexity. In this paper, we propose efficient soft
detection algorithms based on differential metrics. We apply the
differential metrics for the list sphere decoding, and propose the
list gradient algorithm. We further propose a novel algorithm
that can generate the values of LLR and provide a trade-off
between performance and complexity. The proposed algorithms
do not need the QR decomposition and matrix inversion. The
proposed algorithms have fixed complexity, and are appropriate
for pipelined hardware implementation. The numerical results
verify the efficiency of our algorithms.
Index Terms—MIMO detection, soft detection, differential
metrics, fixed-complexity.
I. I NTRODUCTION
With the increasing demand of communication through-
put on limited spectrum resources, multiple-input multiple-
output (MIMO) transmission is currently considered the most
promising technology to provide high data rates and reliable
link quality for wireless communications [1]-[3]. The system
capacity can be enhanced by the spatial multiplexing, such
as the Vertical Bell Labs Layered Space-Time (V-BLAST)
architecture in the MIMO system, in which independent data
streams are sent over different transmit antennas simultane-
ously, and the interference among these streams appears at each
receive antenna. To attain the spectrum efficiency of the MIMO
system, the receiver needs an efficient detection algorithm.
The maximum likelihood (ML) detector can achieve minimum
error probability and is crucial for a solid MIMO detector
implementation. Based on the ML solution, soft decisions
for each received bit can improve the bit-error rate (BER)
performance. In the coded MIMO system, the main challenge
of soft detection is to generate the log-likelihood ratio (LLR)
values efficiently and accurately for channel decoder. The exact
maximum a posteriori (MAP) probability detection can guar-
antee the optimal performance, but its realization is difficult
due to the enormous complexity [4]. Therefore, some sub-
optimal soft detections have been proposed, such as max-log
approximation, list-sphere decoding (LSD), and other related
versions in [5]-[11]. However, some of the above methods have
high complexity and some have variable complexity. Both of
these lead to the unsuitable real implementation.
In this paper, we propose algorithms that can efficiently
generate soft outputs for the detection of coded MIMO sys-
tems. We can first apply the SD algorithm, or other algorithms
978-1-5090-5932-4/17/$31.00 ©2017 IEEE
like the gradient search algorithms (GSA) in [10][11] to
obtain the vector associated with the ML detection for the
MIMO system. Based on the differential metrics, we propose
algorithms that can generate the approximate LLR values with
a good trade-off between performance and complexity. The
GSA can be applied in the max-log approximation, such that
the multiplicative operations are only necessary before the
searching process. During the searching process, we need only
the additive operation. We give the list gradient algorithm
(LGA) that can be implemented based on differential met-
rics. After we obtain the ML-detected vector, based on the
differential metrics, we can obtain the all candidate vectors
that differ from the ML detected vector only for a few bits.
We also propose the soft output GSA that can generate the
approximate LLR values with reduced complexity. In this
algorithm, we show that the differential metrics associated with
the ML sequence can serve as the soft values of bits of the
ML-detected sequence.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section II
introduces the signal model and offers a brief review of the
max-log approximation and LSD algorithms. The proposed
algorithms are presented in Section III, and Section IV offers
some numerical results to verify the efficiency of proposed
algorithms. Finally, Section V concludes this paper.
Notation Bold upper- and lower-case letters denote matrices
and column vectors, respectively. We use (⋅)𝑇 , (⋅)𝐻 and ∥
⋅ ∥ to represent transpose, conjugate transpose and Euclidean
vector norm, respectively. The size of a set 𝒮 is denoted by
∣𝒮∣. The real and imaginary parts are indicated by Re{ } and
Im{ }, respectively. The 𝑘th element of a vector v and the
(𝑚, 𝑛)th element of a matrix M are correspondingly denoted
by [v]𝑘 and [M]𝑚𝑛 , respectively. The sign of a real number 𝑥
is denoted by sgn(𝑥).
II. P RELIMINARIES
A. System Model
Consider a MIMO system with 𝑛𝑇 and 𝑛𝑅 as the transmit
and receive antennas, respectively. It can be referred to as an
𝑛𝑇 -by-𝑛𝑅 MIMO system. The received signal is sampled at
the 𝑛𝑅 receive antennas during a time slot that can be stacked
into a vector y = (𝑦1 , 𝑦2 , . . . , 𝑦𝑛𝑅 )𝑇 , where 𝑦𝑘 denotes the
received signal on the 𝑘th receive antenna. Assuming a flat
fading channel between each pair of transmit and receive
antennas, we can write the complex baseband received signal
vector y as
y = Hs + v (1)
where s is a vector of 𝑛𝑇 transmitted symbols, the channel
matrix H is of size 𝑛𝑅 × 𝑛𝑇 , and v is the noise vector of
size 𝑛𝑅 . The entries of H are assumed to be of independent
identically distributed (i.i.d.) complex zero-mean Gaussian dis- to find the list 𝐼 of all candidate vectors that lie inside a sphere.
tribution with unit variance. The noises at the receive antennas We can write
are also of i.i.d. complex zero-mean Gaussian distribution with (∑ 1 2
)
the variance 2𝜎𝑣2 . The complex-valued signal model of (1) can s∈𝐼:𝑏𝑖 (s)=+1 exp(− 𝑁0 ∥y − Hs∥ }
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ∣y) ≈ log ∑ 1 2
.
be expressed as the real-valued model given by s∈𝐼:𝑏𝑖 (s)=−1 exp(− 𝑁0 ∥y − Hs∥ }
[ ] [ ][ ] [ ] (6)
Re{y} Re{H} -Im{H} Re{s} Re{v}
= + . (2) However, the LSD still has some major drawbacks, such as
Im{y} Im{H} Re{H} Im{s} Im{v}
variable complexity and that the searching complexity grows
For convenience, we still write the signal model in (2) as exponentially with 𝑛𝑇 . We can apply the gradient search
the signal model in (1), and re-define y, s and v as the real- method [11] to the LSD, such that we can reduce the com-
valued vectors of sizes 2𝑛𝑅 , 2𝑛𝑇 and 2𝑛𝑅 , respectively, while plexity and attain fixed-complexity.
H is re-defined as a real-valued matrix of size 2𝑛𝑅 × 2𝑛𝑇 . Let
𝑁 ≜2𝑛𝑅 and 𝑀 ≜2𝑛𝑇 for convenience. III. T HE P ROPOSED A LGORITHMS
The ML detection for the MIMO system at the receiver A. Differential Metrics
finds the transmit vector s that minimizes the metric
We first introduce the differential metrics [10] [11], based
ŝML = arg min ∥y − Hs∥2 . (3) on which we develop the proposed algorithms. The ML
s
detection of s in (3) can also be obtained as
The elements of s are in the set of modulation constellation
𝒬, and the vector of s is composed of 𝑀 ∣𝒬∣ information bits, ŝML = arg max{∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 } (7)
s
which are denoted by 𝑏1 , 𝑏2 , . . . , 𝑏𝑀 ∣𝒬∣ . The soft information
desired by the channel decoder is the a posteriori log-likelihood where s0 is the initial sequence that can be set as any arbitrary
𝑃 (s:𝑏𝑖 (s)=+1∣y)
ratio 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ∣y) = log( 𝑃 (s:𝑏𝑖 (s)=−1∣y) ), 1 ≤ 𝑖 ≤ 𝑀 ∣𝒬∣, where vector. We can regard ∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 in (7) as
𝑏𝑖 (s) denotes the 𝑖th bit associated with a vector (or sequence) the differential metric. To efficiently calculate the differential
s. We assume that the bits 𝑏1 , 𝑏2 , . . . , 𝑏𝑀 ∣𝒬∣ are mutually metric, we define
independent, and all bits are equally likely to be 1 or -1 before
observing y. We have 𝑃 (𝑏𝑖 = +1) = 𝑃 (𝑏𝑖 = −1) = 12 . Δ(𝑘) = ∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 (8)
Therefore the exact MAP detection can be written as in which s and s0 are different only in the 𝑘th bit, and therefore
(∑ 1 2
)
s:𝑏𝑖 (s)=+1 exp(− 𝑁0 ∥y − Hs∥ }
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ∣y) = log ∑ 1 (4) s0 − s = (0, . . . , 0, ±2, 0, . . . , 0)𝑇 ,
2
s:𝑏𝑖 (s)=−1 exp(− 𝑁0 ∥y − Hs∥ }
(9)
s0 + s = (±2, . . . , ±2, 0, ±2, . . . , ±2)𝑇 .
which is the associated LLR value of each bit 𝑏𝑖 . Although the
Accordingly, we can write (8) as
exact MAP detection can achieve the optimal performance for
soft decision, its realization is difficult due to the enormous Δ(𝑘) = −2y𝑇 H(s0 − s) + (s0 + s)𝑇 H𝑇 H(s0 − s). (10)
complexity.
Then by (9) and with some manipulation, we have
B. Max-Log Approximation
Δ(𝑘) = −4 sgn([s0 ]𝑘 ) [y𝑇 H]𝑘
Since the complexity of exact MAP detection is increased
𝑁
∑
rapidly with 𝑛𝑇 size and difficult to implement, many approx- (11)
imate methods have been proposed. The max-log approxima- +4 sgn([s0 ]𝑘 ) sgn([s0 ]ℓ ) [H𝑇 H]ℓ𝑘 .
tion method is to approximate each of the sums in (4) with ℓ=1,ℓ∕=𝑘
their largest term as
( ) We refer to Δ(𝑘), 1 ≤ 𝑘 ≤ 𝑀 , as the differential metrics
maxs:𝑏𝑖 (s)=+1 exp(− 𝑁10 ∥y − Hs∥2 } of order one. Further, consider differential metrics of higher
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ∣y) ≈ log . (5)
maxs:𝑏𝑖 (s)=−1 exp(− 𝑁10 ∥y − Hs∥2 } orders, in which s0 and s differ in more than one bit. Denoted
as Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 ) for the differential metric in (7) for which s0
For the numerical stability condition, sums as in (4) can be and s differ only in the 𝑘1 th and 𝑘2 th bits, and similar for
evaluated by the repeated use of the Jacobian logarithm [8], Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , 𝑘3 ), and so on. Note that y𝑇 H and H𝑇 H can be
and the max-log approximation method can be viewed as a calculated in advance before the search for the solution in (4).
special case. However, even though the max-log approximation For convenience, we define
avoids the summation in (4), it still needs to search over all
possible s to find the largest value of norms, Therefore, the [K]𝑘ℓ = sgn([s0 ]𝑘 ) sgn([s0 ]ℓ ) [H𝑇 H]𝑘ℓ (12)
max-log approximation method may still have the complexity
that is increased exponentially with 𝑛𝑇 . for 1≤𝑘, ℓ≤𝑀 . We have the following results for differential
metrics of different orders
C. List-Sphere Decoding Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 ) = Δ(𝑘1 ) + Δ(𝑘2 ) − 8[K]𝑘1 𝑘2 (13)
The LSD is another well-known approximation method.
The expression in (4) can be approximated by restricting the Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , 𝑘3 ) = Δ(𝑘1 ) + Δ(𝑘2 ) + Δ(𝑘3 )
sums to a smaller set of the symbol vectors. The LSD uses (14)
Schnorr-Euchner version sphere decoding (SE-SD) algorithm − 8[K]𝑘1 𝑘2 − 8[K]𝑘2 𝑘3 − 8[K]𝑘3 𝑘1
 (+1) (−1)
and Where 𝑏𝑖 and 𝑏𝑖 denote the set of s for which the
Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , . . . , 𝑘𝑀 ) = Δ(𝑘1 ) + Δ(𝑘2 ) + ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ + Δ(𝑘𝑀 ) corresponding 𝑖th bit is +1 and −1, respectively. For each
𝑀 𝑀
bit, one of the minima in (24) is given by the metric
∑ ∑ 𝜆ML = ∥y − HsML ∥2 , associated with ML detection. The
−8 [K]𝑘ℓ1 𝑘ℓ2 . (15)
other minimum in (24) is define as
ℓ1 =1 ℓ2 =ℓ1 +1
𝜆ML
𝑖 = min ∥y − Hs∥2
(𝑏ML )
(25)
s∈𝑏𝑖 𝑖
We also have the following recursive relations,
Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , 𝑘3 ) = Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 ) + Δ(𝑘3 ) where the counter-hypothesis 𝑏𝑖ML denotes the 𝑖th binary
− 8[K]𝑘2 𝑘3 − 8[K]𝑘1 𝑘3 (16) complement bit corresponding to sML . Then the max-log LLR
can be written as
{
Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , 𝑘3 , 𝑘4 ) = Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , 𝑘3 ) + Δ(𝑘4 )
𝜆ML − 𝜆ML
𝑖 , if 𝑏ML
𝑖 = −1
− 8[K]𝑘1 𝑘4 − 8[K]𝑘2 𝑘4 − 8[K]𝑘3 𝑘4 (17) 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ (26)
𝜆𝑖 − 𝜆 , if 𝑏ML
ML ML
𝑖 = +1.
Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , . . . , 𝑘𝑀 ) = Δ(𝑘1 , 𝑘2 , . . . , 𝑘𝑀 −1 ) + Δ(𝑘𝑀 ) Based on the differential metrics and the associated properties,
𝑀
∑ −1 we can efficiently calculate 𝜆ML once and 𝜆ML 𝑗 𝑀 times by
−8 [K]𝑘ℓ 𝑘𝑀 . (18) applying (18).
ℓ=1

For the differential metric in (8), consider the following two
differential metrics
Δ(𝑘) = ∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2
and
Δ′ (𝑘) = ∥y − Hs′0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs′ ∥2
where s0 and s′0 are only distinct on one bit, say the ℓth bit, and
s′ in (20) is distinct from s′0 only on the 𝑘th bit. To efficiently
calculate Δ′ (𝑘)’s based on Δ(𝑘)’s by (11), we have
{ ∥y − Hs∥2 = ∥y − HsML ∥2 − Δ( )
Δ(𝑘) + 8sgn([s′0 ]𝑘 )sgn([s′0 ]ℓ )[K]𝑘ℓ , if 𝑘 ∕= ℓ,
Δ′ (𝑘) =
−Δ(𝑘), if 𝑘 = ℓ.
(21)
For the modulation with large constellation, such as the quadra-
ture amplitude modulation (QAM), we can still assume the
signal models in (1) with the elements of s as +1 or 1. For
example, consider the 16-QAM, the elements of original s are
in the set {±1, ±3}, and the bit-mapping can be represented
as
𝑠 = 𝑏1 (𝑏2 + 2) = 2𝑏1 + 𝑏1 𝑏2 = 2𝑏1 + 𝑏′2 , 𝑏′2 ≜ 𝑏1 𝑏2 , (22)
where 𝑠 ∈ {±1, ±3} and 𝑏1 , 𝑏2 , 𝑏′2 ∈ {±1}. For example, the
symbol 𝑠 = −3 corresponds to (𝑏1 , 𝑏2 ) = (−1, 1), and 𝑠 = 1
corresponds to (𝑏1 , 𝑏2 ) = (1, −1). Therefore, we can write
′
s = 2b1 + b2 . Then we can write (1) as
[ ]
′ [ ] b1
y = Hs + v = H(2b1 + b2 ) + v = 2H H +v
b2
= H𝑞 b + v (23)
[ ]
′
where H𝑞 = 2H H and b = (b𝑇1 b2𝑇 )𝑇 . Based on (23), we
can apply the proposed algorithm to detect the MIMO signal
with QAM modulation. In [10][11], efficient ML detection
algorithms are developed based on differential metrics.
B. GSA for Max-Log Approximation
The max-log approximation of (5) can be simplified and
expressed [5] as
C. List Gradient Algorithm
We can apply the differential metrics for the LSD algorithm
(19) in (6) with some modification. We refer to this as the list
gradient algorithm (LGA). First, we can obtain the ML solution
by the SD or other algorithms like [10][11]. Then we can
(20) obtain the list 𝐼 of all candidate vectors as the vectors that
differ from sML only on a little number of bits. We calculate
the metric 𝜆ML = ∥y−HsML ∥2 , followed by calculating other
metrics in the numerator and denominator of (6) as
(27)
where Δ( ) in (27) may of order 1 or 2. We can obtain those
Δ( )’s for which sML is the initial sequence by applying
(21) several times, such that we can transform the original
differential metrics Δ( )’s associated with s0 to the differential
metrics associated with sML .
D. Soft Output GSA
We can apply the gradient search method to generate
the approximate LLR values with reduced complexity. The
simplified max-log approximation in (24) can be expressed as
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ max (∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 )
(+1)
s∈𝑏𝑖
(28)
− max (∥y − Hs0 ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 )
(−1)
s∈𝑏𝑖
in which s0 can be any constant vector. In order to generate
the LLR values, we need to estimate ŝML sequence. Then, we
can use ŝML as the initial sequence, and we define Δ(𝑘) by
Δ(𝑘) = ∥y − HŝML ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 , 1 ≤ 𝑘 ≤ 𝑀, (29)
in which s and ŝM𝐿 are different only in the 𝑘th bit. The
associated Δ(𝑘)’s can be effectively calculated based on (11)
and (21). Note that now the preliminary estimation of 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 )
has the approximation
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ max (∥y − HŝML ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 )
s∈𝑏𝑖
(+1)

(30)
2
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ min ∥y − Hs∥ − min ∥y − Hs∥ . 2
(24) − max (∥y − HŝML ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 ).
(−1) (+1) (−1)
s∈𝑏𝑖 s∈𝑏𝑖 s∈𝑏𝑖
 0
10 1500
uncoded ML max−log approx. (SE−SD)
hard decision max−log approx. (GSA)
exact LLR (optimal soft detector) LSD, N = 4
Iist
−1 max−log approx. (SE−SD) LSD, N =6
10 Iist
LSD, N = 4
Iist proposed LGA, N =4
Iist
proposed LGA, N =4
list proposed LGA, NIist = 6
1000

No. of Multiplications
proposed soft output GSA, Nlist = 4
−2 proposed soft output GSA
10 proposed soft output GSA, N =8
list
BER

−3
10
500

−4
10

−5
10 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18
Eb/No (dB) Eb/No (dB)

Fig. 1: BER performance for the 4 × 4 coded MIMO system. Fig. 2: Complexity of the multiplicative operations during
process of generating LLR values.

If [ŝML ]𝑖 = 1, then the first item of (30) is 0, and

6000
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ − max (∥y − HŝML ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 ). (31)
(−1)
s∈𝑏𝑖 max−log approx. (SE−SD)
max−log approx. (GSA)
5000
While for [ŝML ]𝑖 = −1, the second item of (30) is 0, and LSD, N = 4
Iist
LSD, N =6
Iist
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ max (∥y − HŝML ∥2 − ∥y − Hs∥2 ). (32) 4000
proposed LGA, N
Iist
=4
(+1)
s∈𝑏𝑖 proposed LGA, N =6
No. of Additions

Iist
proposed soft output GSA, N =4
By the above results and referring to (29), we can write 3000 proposed soft output GSA, N
Iist
=8
Iist
ML
𝑃 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ −sgn([ŝ ]𝑖 ) Δ(𝑖). (33)
2000
where 𝑃 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) denotes the approximation of preliminary esti-
mation.
1000
To produce a more accurate 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ), we can use Δ(𝑖)’s and
apply (13) to calculate Δ(𝑖1 , 𝑖2 )’s, such that we can find some
associated sequences in the vicinity of ŝML . These sequences 0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18
are stored in 𝐼. A more efficient approximation of 𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) can Eb/No (dB)

be expressed as
∑ Fig. 3: Complexity of the additive operations during process
sgn(s) ∣Δ(𝑖)∣ 𝛼(s)
𝐿(𝑏𝑖 ) ≈ s∈𝐼 ∑ (34) of generating LLR values.
s∈𝐼 𝛼(s)

where 𝛼(s) is the weight coefficient for each s ∈ 𝐼. For

example, if the list 𝐼 has 4 sequences, we can set the values
𝛼(s) as [1, 3/4, 1/2, 1/4], where 𝛼(ŝML ) = 1, and the sorting
depends on the differential metrics between ŝML and s.
IV. N UMERICAL R ESULTS
In this section, the BER performance and complexity of the
proposed algorithms are verified by Monte Carlo simulations.
We assume the receiver has the estimated channel responses.
We apply our algorithms on the 4 × 4 MIMO systems with
quaternary phase-shift keying (QPSK) modulation, and we use
a convolutional code with code rate 1/3 and constraint length
7. Compared with the single antenna system, we normalize
the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at each receive antenna as
𝛾 = 𝛾MIMO/𝑛𝑅 , where 𝛾MIMO denotes the SNR at the
receiver. We compare the proposed algorithms with the max-
log approximation and the LSD.
Fig. 1 shows the BER comparison for the proposed LGA
and soft output GSA algorithms, respectively, with the max-
log approximation and LSD. The proposed LGA algorithm
has the same performance as the LSD algorithm, while the
proposed soft output GSA has performance depending on the
sizes of the list 𝐼, and the proposed soft output GSA performs
close to the max-log approximation performance with very
low complexity. The numbers of multiplicative and additive
operations during the search of LLR values are shown in Fig.
2 and Fig. 3, respectively. For the proposed gradient search
method, the multiplicative operations are only necessary before
the searching process, during which only additive operations
are necessary. Therefore, for the proposed soft output GSA,
the number of multiplications is zero in the searching process,
as shown in Fig. 2. In Fig. 3, we observe that the proposed
soft output GSA and LGA has lower addition complexity than
 TABLE I: C OMPUTATIONAL C OMPLEXITY A SSESSMENT
Algorithm No. of operations Fixed complexity?
𝛽𝑀
max-log approx. (SE-SD) 𝒪(2 ), 𝛽 ∈ (0, 1] No
𝜂𝑀
LSD 𝒪(2 ), 𝜂 ∈ (0, 1] No
3 3
proposed LGA 2 (𝑀 ) Yes
3
proposed soft output GSA 𝑀 Yes

11 11
10 10
max−log approx. (SE−SD) max−log approx. (SE−SD)
LSD, NIist = nT + (nT/2) LSD, N = nT + (nT/2)
10 10 Iist
10 10
proposed LGA, N = nT + (nT/2) proposed LGA, NIist = nT + (nT/2)
Iist

9 9
proposed soft output GSA, NIist = 2nT
10 10

8 8
10 10
No. of Multiplications

No. of Additions
7 7
10 10

6 6
10 10

5 5
10 10

4 4
10 10

3 3
10 10

2 2
10 10
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
No. of Antenna No. of Antenna

Fig. 4: The relation of numbers of antennas and multiplicative Fig. 5: The relation of numbers of antennas and additive
operations during the process of generating LLR values. operations during the process of generating LLR values.

other algorithms. Fig. 4 and Fig. 5 compare the complexity
during the searching process for proposed algorithms, the max-
log approximation and LSD algorithm over the numbers of
antennas. Compared with other algorithms, we see that the
proposed LGA has lower numbers of both multiplicative or
additive operations for a wide range of antenna numbers.
Furthermore, the proposed soft output GSA needs only the
additive operations in the searching process for LLR values.
Finally, Tab. I summarizes the coarse complexity (additions
and multiplications) comparison for calculating the soft outputs
of the proposed algorithms and other algorithms.
V. C ONCLUSION
In this paper, we propose efficient soft detection algorithms
for the coded MIMO system. Our algorithms are developed
based on differential metrics, which have efficient recursive
calculation for different orders. The proposed algorithms do
not need the QR decomposition and matrix inversion. The
proposed LGA is a low-complexity algorithm developed based
on the LSD algorithm and differential metrics. We also propose
the soft output GSA that provides a good trade-off between
performance and complexity. In addition, the proposed algo-
rithms have fixed complexity, and are suitable for hardware
implementation. The numerical results verify the efficiency of
our algorithms.
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