Massive MIMO without CSI: When Non-Coherent Communication Meets Many Antennas

Abstract

Under high-mobility scenarios, the traditional coherent demodulation schemes (CDS) have limited performance, because reference signals cannot effectively track the channel variations with an affordable overhead. As an alternative solution, non-coherent demodulation schemes (NCDS) based on differential modulation have been proposed. Even in the absence of reference signals, they are capable of outperforming the CDS with a reduced complexity. The literature on NCDS laid the theoretical foundations for simplified channel and signal models, often single-carrier and spatially uncorrelated flat-fading channels. This chapter explains the most recent results assuming orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) signaling and realistic channel models