In this letter, efficient closed-form formulas for the exact and asymptotic average bit error probability (ABEP) of space shift keying (SSK) systems are derived over Rayleigh fading channels with imperfect channel state information (CSI). Specifically, for a generic 2×NR multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system with the maximum likelihood (ML) detection, the impact of imperfect CSI is taken into consideration in terms of two types of channel estimation errors with the fixed variance and the variance as a function of the number of pilot symbols and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Then, the explicit evaluations of the bit error floor (BEF) and asymptotic SNR loss are carried out based on the derived asymptotic ABEP formula, which accounts for the impact of imperfect CSI on the SSK system. The numerical results are presented to validate the exactness of our theoretical analysis.

A comprehensive model is presented for estimating the bit error rate (BER) of write disturbance in a resistive memory composed of a cross-point array. While writing a datum into the selected address, the non-selected addresses are biased by word-line (WL) and bit-line (BL). The stored datum in the non-selected addresses will be disturbed if the bias is large enough. It is necessary for the current flowing through the non-selected address to be calculated in order to estimate the BER of the write disturbance. Since it takes a long time to calculate the current flowing in a large-scale cross-point array, several simplified circuits have been utilized to decrease the calculating time. However, these simplified circuits are available to the selected address, not to the non-selected one. In this paper, new simplified circuits are proposed for calculating the current flowing through the non-selected address. The proposed and the conventional simplified circuits are used, and on that basis the trade-off between the write disturbance and the write error is discussed. Furthermore, the error correcting code (ECC) is introduced to improve the trade-off and to provide the low-cost memory chip matching current production lines.

In this paper, we propose and analyze the opportunistic amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying scheme using antenna selection in conjunction with different adaptive transmission techniques over Rayleigh fading channels. In this scheme, the best antenna of a source and the best relay are selected for communication between the source and destination. Closed-form expressions for the outage probability and average symbol error rate (SER) are derived to confirm that increasing the number of antennas is the best option as compared with increasing the number of relays. We also obtain closed-form expressions for the average channel capacity under three different adaptive transmission techniques: 1) optimal power and rate adaptation; 2) constant power with optimal rate adaptation; and 3) channel inversion with a fixed rate. The channel capacity performance of the considered adaptive transmission techniques is evaluated and compared with a different number of relays and various antennas configurations for each adaptive technique. Our derived analytical results are verified through extensive Monte Carlo simulations.

Wireless body area networks (BANs) are attracting much attention due to their suitable for healthcare and medical applications. Unfortunately, electrostatic discharge (ESD) is a major electromagnetic (EM) noise source that can degrade wireless communication performance. In this study, we measure EM noise power in the 2.4GHz and 30MHz bands for indirect ESD testing specified in IEC 61000-4-2 standard, and derived a statistical ESD noise model from the measurement results. The ESD noise power was found to follow a lognormal distribution in both 2.4GHz and 30MHz bands. We use this ESD noise model to conduct bit error rate (BER) simulations in a communication channel with additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) plus ESD noise at 2.4GHz and 30MHz bands. The result is that the BER performance is virtually the same in both bands, and decreases with the signal to noise power ratio (SNR). It is also shown that an error floor exists in the BER performances at both frequencies, which, if the ESD noise power is larger than the Gaussian noise, cannot be improved by increasing the SNR. Although the ESD noise power at 2.4GHz band is nearly 30dB smaller than that at 30MHz band, the signal attenuation along the human body at 2.4GHz band is much larger compared to 30MHz band. This may yield a similar SNR level at 30MHz and 2.4GHz bands in an ESD-dominated environment, so that the 2.4GHz band does not have an obvious merit for BAN applications. Since there are so many in-band interference sources at 2.4GHz band, the 30MHz band seems more promising for vital data transmission in a BAN scenario even in an ESD-dominated environment.

This paper proposes and theoretically analyzes the performance of amplify-and-forward (AF) relaying free-space optical (FSO) systems using avalanche photodiode (APD) over atmospheric turbulence channels. APD is used at each relay node and at the destination for optical signal conversion and amplification. Both serial and parallel relaying configurations are considered and the subcarrier binary phase-shift keying (SC-BPSK) signaling is employed. Closed-form expressions for the outage probability and the bit-error rate (BER) of the proposed system are analytically derived, taking into account the accumulating amplification noise as well as the receiver noise at the relay nodes and at the destination. Monte-Carlo simulations are used to validate the theoretical analysis, and an excellent agreement between the analytical and simulation results is confirmed.

This paper investigates the detection performance of an improved energy detector for a secondary user with spatially correlated multiple antennas. In an improved energy detector, an arbitrary positive power operation p replaces the squaring operation in a conventional energy detector, and the optimum value of p that gives the best detection performance may be different from 2. Firstly, for a given value of p, we derive closed-form expressions for the probability of detection and the probability of false alarm when antennas at the secondary user are exponentially correlated. We then find the optimum value of p for two different detection criteria-maximizing the probability of detection for a target probability of false alarm, and minimizing the probability of false alarm for a target probability of detection. We show that the optimum p is strongly dependent on system parameters like number of antennas, antenna correlation coefficient among multiple antennas, and average received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). From results, we infer that, in low SNR regime, the effect of antenna correlation is less pronounced on the optimum p. Finally, we find the optimum values of p and threshold jointly that minimize the total error rate.

In this paper, a threshold-based I-Q diversity combining scheme for ultra-high frequency (UHF) radio frequency identification (RFID) readers with a quadrature receiver is proposed in the aspect of improving the tag detection performance. In addition, the performance of the proposed scheme is evaluated as the closed-form expressions. In particular, its statistical characteristics are detailed and its performance is compared to that of conventional schemes over independent and identically distributed Rician fading conditions in terms of average signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), bit error rate (BER), and the average number of required combining process. Numerical results indicate that the proposed scheme enables processing power control through threshold control while meeting the required quality of service compared to conventional schemes.

This paper analyzes the transmission performances of visible light communication (VLC) based on unipolar orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), which is compatible with intensity modulation and direct detection (IM/DD). Three existing unipolar OFDM schemes, namely DC biased optical OFDM (DCO-OFDM), asymmetrically clipped optical OFDM (ACO-OFDM), and flip-OFDM are investigated and compared. While these three schemes have been analyzed for indoor optical wireless communication (OWC) subject to the limitation on the transmit optical power, they have not been carefully investigated and compared for VLC when a large transmit power is available due to the illumination requirement, and the signal dynamic range (DR) becomes the main limitation. For the analysis, DR expressions of DCO-OFDM, ACO-OFDM, and flip-OFDM signals are first derived. Then, the bit error rate (BER) expression of each unipolar OFDM scheme is derived in terms of the DR. For data rates in the range of 1-10Mbps, under the system parameters based on typical indoor environments, DCO-OFDM is observed to outperform the other two schemes. This superiority of DCO-OFDM is in contrast with previously reported results that indicate the attractiveness of ACO-OFDM and flip-OFDM over DCO-OFDM when the transmit optical power is the main limitation. Finally, light dimming is considered to identify the illumination level below which DCO-OFDM loses this superiority.

This paper describes a soft-error tolerant and margin-enhanced nMOS-pMOS reversed 6T SRAM cell. The 6T SRAM bitcell comprises pMOS access and driver transistors, and nMOS load transistors. Therefore, the nMOS and pMOS masks are reversed in comparison with those of a conventional bitcell. In scaled process technology, The pMOS transistors present advantages of small random dopant fluctuation, strain-enhanced saturation current, and small soft-error sensitivity. The four-pMOS and two-nMOS structure improves the soft-error rate plus operating margin. We conduct SPICE and neutron-induced soft-error simulations to evaluate the n-p reversed 6T SRAM bitcell in 130-nm to 22-nm processes. At the 22-nm node, a multiple-cell-upset and single-bit-upset SERs are improved by 34% and 51% over a conventional 6T cell. Additionally, the static noise margin and read cell current are 2.04× and 2.81× improved by leveraging the pMOS benefits.

In this paper, a low-complexity precoding scheme for minimizing the bit error rate (BER) subject to fixed power constraint for distributed antenna systems with non-Kronecker correlation over spatially correlated Rayleigh fading channels is presented. Based on an approximated BER bound and a newly defined compressed signal-to-noise ratio (CSNR) criterion, closed-form expressions of power allocation and beamforming matrix are derived for the developed precoding scheme. This scheme not only has the calculation of the power allocation less than and also obtain the BER performance close to that of the existing optimal precoding scheme. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme can provide BER lower than the equal power allocation and single mode beamforming scheme, has almost the same performance as the existing optimal scheme.

Wireless body area networks (BANs) are attracting great attention as a future technology of wireless networks for healthcare and medical applications. Wireless BANs can generally be divided into two categories, i.e., wearable BANs and implant BANs. However, the performance requirements and channel propagation characteristics of these two kinds of BANs are quite different from each other, that is, wireless signals are approximately transmitted along the human body as a surface wave in wearable BANs, on the other hand, the signals are transmitted through the human tissues in implant BANs. As an effective solution for this problem, this paper first introduces a dual-mode communication system, which is composed of transmitters for in-body and on-body communications and a receiver for both communications. Then, we evaluate the bit error rate (BER) performance of the dual-mode communication system via computer simulations based on realistic channel models, which can reasonably represent the propagation characteristics of on-body and in-body communications. Finally, we conduct a link budget analysis based on the derived BER performances and discuss the link parameters including system margin, maximum link distance, data rate and required transmit power. Our computer simulation results and analysis results demonstrate the feasibility of the dual-mode communication system in wireless BANs.

Space diversity reception is well known as a technique that can improve the performance of wireless communication systems without any temporal and spectral resource expansion. Implant body area networks (BANs) require high-speed transmission and low energy consumption. Therefore, applying spatial diversity reception to implant BANs can be expected to fulfill these requirements. For this purpose, this paper presents a local frequency offset diversity system with π/4-differential quadrature phase shift keying (DQPSK) for implant BANs that offer improved communication performance with a simpler receiver structure, and evaluates the proposal's bit error rate (BER) performance by theoretical analysis. In the theoretical analysis, it is difficult to analytically derive the probability density function (pdf) on the combined signal-to-noise power ratio (SNR) at the local offset frequency diversity receiver output. Therefore, this paper adopts the moment generating function approximation method and demonstrates that the resulting theoretical analyses yield performances that basically match the results of computer simulations. We first confirm that the local frequency offset diversity reception can effectively improve the communication performance of implant BANs. Next, we perform an analysis of a realistic communication performance, namely, a link budget analysis based on derived BER performance and evaluate the link parameters including system margin, maximum link distance and required transmit power. These analyses demonstrate that the local frequency offset diversity system can realize a reliable communication link in a realistic implant BAN scenario.

Much work in cooperative communication has been done from the perspective of the physical and network layers. However, the exact impact of signal error rate performance on cooperative routing discovery still remains unclear in multihop ad hoc networks. In this paper, we show the symbol error rate (SER) performance improvement obtained from cooperative commutation, and examine how to incorporate the factor of SER into the distributed routing discovery scheme called DGCR (Dynamic Geographic Cooperative Routing). For a single cooperative communication hop, we present two types of metric to specify the degree that one node is suitable for becoming the relay node. One metric is the potential of a node to relay with optimal SER performance. The other metric is the distance of a node to the straight line that passes through the last forwarding node and the destination. Based on location knowledge and contention scheme, we combine the two metrics into a composite metric to choose the relay node. The forwarding node is chosen dynamically according to the positions of the actual relay node and the destination. Simulation results show that our approach outperforms non-cooperative geographic routing significantly in terms of symbol error rate, and that DGCR's SER performance is better than traditional geographic cooperative routing with slight path length increase.

In this letter, we investigate the performance of cooperative decode-and-forward multiple-input multiple-output relaying system using orthogonal space-time block codes with piecewise-linear (PL) receiver over correlated Nakagami-m fading channels for integer values of m. We derive the closed-form expression for the exact bit error rates of binary phase shift keying signals. The analytical expression is validated through numerical results. It is shown that the performance of PL receiver outperforms that of conventional maximal ratio combining receiver.

This paper presents a proposed NMOS-centered 6T SRAM cell layout that reduces a neutron-induced multiple-cell-upset (MCU) SER on a same wordline. We implemented an 1-Mb SRAM macro in a 65-nm CMOS process and irradiated neutrons as a neutron-accelerated test to evaluate the MCU SER. The proposed 6T SRAM macro improves the horizontal MCU SER by 67–98% compared with a general macro that has PMOS-centered 6T SRAM cells.

The focus of this study is the performance of the relaying network with incremental selective decode-and-forward (ISDF) protocol in non-selective slow Nakagami-m fading channels. To enhance bandwidth efficiency, when the direct transmission is not successful the relay is used to retransmit a clean copy of the source signal. The proposed protocol achieves a significant reduction in the power consumption and an improvement in performance compared to the fixed decode-and-forward (DF). The exact symbol error rate (SER) of M-PSK modulation for the ISDF protocol over general fading channels is derived. However, as the exact SER analysis is very complicated, we provide an approximated SER expression. Based on this approximation, we provide an optimum power allocation coefficient where the aggregate transmit power constraint is imposed on the source and the relay. Our results show that at least 50% of total power must be used by the direct link, and the remaining may be used by the relay. Furthermore, power allocation in this protocol is independent of the quality of the source-destination channel and modulation constellation size. Numerical results show that the ISDF protocol can reduce the average transmit power with respect to the fixed DF protocol.

A multiuser precoding algorithm based on matching weighted signal-to-leakage-and-noise ratio (SLNR) is proposed for multiuser MIMO downlink systems. In the proposed algorithm, the matching weight factor is selected based on the effective channel gain, and the leakage power caused by each user is weighted by the factor. The precoding vector is obtained by maximizing the matching weighted SLNR. Simulation results show the superiority of the proposed scheme in terms of bit error rate over the conventional SLNR schemes.

Real-time on-chip measurement of bit error rate (BER) for high-speed analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) does not only require expensive multi-port high-speed data acquisition equipment but also enormous post-processing. This paper proposes a low-cost built-in-self-test (BIST) circuit for high-speed ADC BER test. Conventionally, the calculation of BER requires a high-speed adder. The presented method takes the advantages of Gray coding and only needs simple logic circuits for BER evaluation. The prototype of the BIST circuit is fabricated along with a 5-bit high-speed flash ADC in a 90-nm CMOS process. The active area is only 90 µm 70 µm and the average power consumption is around 0.3 mW at 700 MS/s. The measurement of the BIST circuit shows consistent results with the measurement by external data acquisition equipment.

This paper aims at channel modeling and bit error rate (BER) performance improvement with diversity reception for in-body to on-body ultra wideband (UWB) communication for capsule endoscope application. The channel characteristics are firstly extracted from 3.4 to 4.8 GHz by using finite difference time domain (FDTD) simulations incorporated with an anatomical human body model, and then a two-path impulse response channel model is proposed. Based on the two-path channel model, a spatial diversity reception technique is applied to improve the communication performance. Since the received signal power at each receiver location follows a lognormal distribution after summing the two path components, we investigate two methods to approximate the lognormal sum distribution in the combined diversity channel. As a result, the method matching a short Gauss-Hermite approximation of the moment generating function (MGF) of the lognormal sum with that of a lognormal distribution exhibits high accuracy and flexibility. With the derived probability density function (PDF) for the combined diversity signals, the average BER performances for impulse-radio (IR) UWB with non-coherent detection are investigated to clarify the diversity effect by both theoretical analysis and computer simulation. The results realize an improvement around 10 dB on Eb/No at BER of 10-3 for two-branch diversity reception.

This paper presents measurement results of bit error rate (BER) and soft error rate (SER) improvement on 150-nm FD-SOI 7T/14T (7-transistor/ 14-transistor) SRAM test chips. The reliability of the 7T/14T SRAM can be dynamically changed by a control signal depending on an operating condition and application. The 14T dependable mode allocates one bit in a 14T cell and improves the BER in a read operation and SER in a retention state, simultaneously. We investigate its error rate mitigating mechanisms using Synopsys TCAD simulator. In our measurements, the minimum operating voltage was improved by 100 mV, the alpha-induced SER was suppressed by 80.0%, and the neutron-induced SER was decreased by 34.4% in the 14T dependable mode over the 7T normal mode.