Antenna Correlation Under Geometry-Based Stochastic Channel Models

Antenna correlation is an important measure for designing multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna systems. A lower antenna correlation indicates a better MIMO performance that can be achieved with the underlying antenna systems. In the antenna design community, it is very common to evaluate the antenna correlation with isotropic or non-isotropic (e.g. Gaussian-distributed) angular power spectrum (APS) as baselines. On the other hand, antenna correlation can also be evaluated via channel transfer function (CTF) under the a given propagation channel, e.g. drawn from the bi-directional geometrybased stochastic channel model. In this paper, the analytic forms for the antenna correlation based on the APS and the CTF are derived, respectively, with their similarities and differences explained. Moreover, a numerical example is also given with a standard channel model to support our findings.