An acquisition scheme for communications in multi-antenna sensor networks with low signal to noise ratio

Abstract

Recent results show that multiple antenna communications can improve the energy efficiency of wireless communications. These techniques are thus attractive for use in wireless sensor networks. In particular, diversity techniques can be used to improve the acquisition of wireless links, especially for low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) situations. This paper presents an acquisition scheme well suited for wireless sensor networks such as low-power wide-area networks (LPWAN) with multiple antenna sensor nodes. The scheme exploits a differentially encoded preamble and receive diversity in order to detect signals at very low SNR without requiring channel state information. We show that it achieves a better trade-off between the probability of acquisition false alarm and failed acquisition than single-antenna communications. Therefore, it enables networks with larger node separation at given transmission power, such as in LPWANs. The scheme’s performance is thoroughly analysed theoretically and verified by simulations.