(1) Dipartimento di Elettronica e Telecomunicazioni, Università di Firenze, Via Di S. Marta, 3, 50139 Firenze, Italy
Abstract:
This paper deals with the processing techniques which are known as reconfigurable antennas: these methods are foreseen to
be a booster for the future high rate wireless communications, both for the benefits in terms of performance and for the capacity
gains. In particular, adaptive digital signal processing can provide improved performance for the desired signal in terms
of error probability or signal-to-noise ratio while the bandwidth efficiency can be increased linearly with the number of
transmitting and receiving antennas. In this article, the main antenna processing techniques are reviewed and described, aiming
at highlighting performance/complexity trade-offs and how they could be implemented in the future systems. The coexistence
of all these different technologies in a wireless environment requires high efficiency and flexibility of the transceiver.
Future transceiver implementations which are based on the Software Defined Radio technology are also reviewed and described.