In this paper, we discuss the applicability of H filtering algorithm for a decision feedback equalizer (DFE) in mobile communications environments. A comparison of bit error rate (BER) performance between a H2 filtering (recursive least squares) algorithm-based and an a priori H filtering algorithm-based fractionally-tap-spaced DFEs in various fading channels is presented. Against, our results are rather pessimistic of the H equalizer, namely, as compared with the H2 equalizer, at most the same or a little better BER performance of the H equalizer is obtained only when the ratio of the average received energy per bit to the white noise power spectral density and the normalized fading rate are large enough, especially in Rician fading channels. Moreover, the H equalizer has the problems of how to choose an appropriate prescribed positive value and computational complexity, therefore it may not be considered as an attractive alternative to the H2 equalizer for wireless communications systems.

When we collect vital data from exercisers by putting wireless sensor nodes to them, the reliability of the wireless data collection is dependent on the position of node on the body of exerciser, therefore, in order to determine the suitable body position, it is essential to evaluate the data collection performances by changing the body positions of nodes in experiments involving human subjects. However, their fair comparison is problematic, because the experiments have no repeatability, that is, we cannot evaluate the performances for multiple body positions in an experiment at the same time. In this paper, we predict the performances by a software network simulator. Using two main functions such as a channel state function and a mobility function, the network simulator can repeatedly generate the same channel and mobility conditions for nodes. Numerical result obtained by the network simulator shows that when collecting vital data from twenty two footballers in a game, among three body position such as waist, forearm and calf, the forearm position gives the highest data collection rate and the predicted data collection rates agree well with the ones obtained by an experiment involving real subjects.

In this paper, we propose a novel spatial filtering technique for orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) signals called "VIrtual Subcarrier Assignment (VISA)." Here, virtual subcarrier is a subcarrier which is not used for data transmission. When a wireless terminal is equipped with multiple antennas, VISA can easily achieve a space division multiple access (SDMA) by assigning a different spectral position of virtual subcarrier to a different user. To realize VISA in an already-existing OFDM-based wireless local area network (WLAN), we discuss an antenna weight control method in the preamble of a signal burst format designed for the IEEE802.11a standard and evaluate the bit error rate (BER) performance in typical indoor wireless environments.

Target location estimation is one of many promising applications of wireless sensor networks. However, until now only few studies have examined location estimation performances in real environments. In this paper, we analyze the effect of walking people on target location estimation performance in three experimental locations. The location estimation is based on received signal strength indicator (RSSI) and maximum likelihood (ML) estimation, and the experimental locations are a corridor of a shopping center, a foyer of a conference center and a laboratory room. The results show that walking people have a positive effect on the location estimation performance if the number of RSSI measurements used in the ML estimation is equal or greater than 3, 2 and 2 in the case of the experiments conducted in the corridor, foyer and laboratory room, respectively. The target location estimation accuracy ranged between 2.8 and 2.3 meters, 2.5 and 2.1 meters, and 1.5 and 1.4 meters in the case of the corridor, foyer and laboratory room, respectively.

Adaptive array antennas, which control their own patterns by means of feed-back or feed-forward control, are effective tools for gain enhancement and interference suppression. However, when applying them to mobile terminals, the problems of hardware complexity and power consumption need to be taken into consideration. One solution is the use of analog device-based adaptive array antennas, such as Reactively Steered Adaptive Array (RESAA) antennas and phased array antennas, which have the attractive characteristics of low cost and power consumption. In this paper, we propose an adaptive beamforming method based on a one-dimension search algorithm for phased array antennas with Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) phase shifters, taking into consideration their slow operating speed due to mechanical structure of the devices. Furthermore, a smoothing processing is introduced to prevent the effect of noise and a multi-resolution alogrithm is proposed to help the system form beams more quickly and stably. Numerical results based on the IEEE 802.11a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) standard show that the proposed method has good interference suppression and gain enhancement capabilities in multipath fading channels.

In this letter, we present a space division multiple access (SDMA) approach for IEEE802.11a-based system employing pre-fast Fourier transform (FFT) adaptive array antenna (AAA) at base station (BS). As the core idea, we propose a preamble subcarrier assignment method to generate different preambles for different users using the same signal burst structure defined by IEEE802.11a, by which BS can effectively distinguish each user from other users and accurately estimate the channel impulse response (CIR) for each user. In this way, SDMA can be easily realized with no significant change in IEEE802.11a-based system. The performance of the proposed SDMA system is evaluated by computer simulation using a realistic spatio-temporal indoor wireless channel model.

Phased array antennas are attractive in terms of low cost and power consumption. This paper proposes a controlling scheme based on a bisection method for phased array antennas employing phase shifters with slow switching speed, which is typical for Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) switches. Computer simulation results, assuming the IEEE 802.11a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) standard, show that the proposed scheme has good gain enhancement capability in multipath fading channels.