On the Capacity of Certain Space-Time Coding Schemes

We take a capacity view of a number of different space-time coding (STC) schemes. While the Shannon capacity of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels has been known for a number of years now, the attainment of these capacities remains a challenging issue in many cases. The introduction of space-time coding schemes in the last 2–3 years has, however, begun paving the way towards the attainment of the promised capacities. In this work we attempt to describe what are the attainable information rates of certain STC schemes, by quantifying their inherent capacity penalties. The obtained results, which are validated for a number of typical cases, cast some interesting light on the merits and tradeoffs of different techniques. Further, they point to future work needed in bridging the gap between the theoretically expected capacities and the performance of practical systems.