Best antenna selection for coded SIMO–OFDM

Multiple receive antennas with optimal combining have been known to improve error performance over fading multipath channels by providing spatial diversity. This benefit is obtained at the cost of greatly increased system complexity due to the need for multiple RF chains and signal combiners. Best antenna selection is a technique that can provide multiple antenna gains with only a single RF chain and no combiners. Best antenna selection is complicated by frequency selectivity in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) as the signal at any one antenna may not be the best at all subcarriers. In this paper, we propose a novel technique for best antenna selection in coded OFDM. To simplify the receiver, we assume a block fading model for the underlying frequency selective channel. The best antenna will then determined based on coding theorems known for block fading channels. Our simulations show significant improvement in coded OFDM performance over existing techniques.