arXiv subjects

Ronald Y. Chang

Publications and source records attributed to Ronald Y. Chang.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Reduced-Feedback Hybrid Precoding for Wideband mmWave MIMO-OFDM Systems

In this paper, we propose a feedback-efficient hybrid precoding framework for wideband millimeter-wave (mmWave) multiple-input multiple-output orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) systems. To mitigate the high cost of radio frequency (RF) chains and channel state information (CSI) feedback in large-scale antenna arrays, we first construct frequency-flat analog precoders by extracting dominant angle-of-arrival (AoA) and angle-of-departure (AoD) directions from sparse frequency-domain channels. For digital precoding, we design a quantized codebook using the Lloyd algorithm and develop a binary-search-based hierarchical interpolation algorithm that adaptively assigns codewords according to subcarrier correlation. The proposed method achieves sub-linear feedback scaling by reducing the feedback overhead from O(K) to O(K/M + log M), where K is the number of subcarriers and M is the pilot spacing. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed method achieves comparable or superior spectral efficiency and bit error rate (BER) performance to existing clustering and interpolation schemes, while significantly reducing computational complexity and exhibiting robustness under imperfect CSI.

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arXiv2025

Sustainable LSTM-Based Precoding for RIS-Aided mmWave MIMO Systems with Implicit CSI

In this paper, we propose a sustainable long short-term memory (LSTM)-based precoding framework for reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted millimeter-wave (mmWave) MIMO systems. Instead of explicit channel state information (CSI) estimation, the framework exploits uplink pilot sequences to implicitly learn channel characteristics, reducing both pilot overhead and inference complexity. Practical hardware constraints are addressed by incorporating the phase-dependent amplitude model of RIS elements, while a multi-label training strategy improves robustness when multiple near-optimal codewords yield comparable performance. Simulations show that the proposed design achieves over 90% of the spectral efficiency of exhaustive search (ES) with only 2.2% of its computation time, cutting energy consumption by nearly two orders of magnitude. The method also demonstrates resilience under distribution mismatch and scalability to larger RIS arrays, making it a practical and energy-efficient solution for sustainable 6G wireless networks.

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arXiv2025

DNN-Based Precoding in RIS-Aided mmWave MIMO Systems With Practical Phase Shift

In this paper, the precoding design is investigated for maximizing the throughput of millimeter wave (mmWave) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems with obstructed direct communication paths. In particular, a reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) is employed to enhance MIMO transmissions, considering mmWave characteristics related to line-of-sight (LoS) and multipath effects. The traditional exhaustive search (ES) for optimal codewords in the continuous phase shift is computationally intensive and time-consuming. To reduce computational complexity, permuted discrete Fourier transform (DFT) vectors are used for finding codebook design, incorporating amplitude responses for practical or ideal RIS systems. However, even if the discrete phase shift is adopted in the ES, it results in significant computation and is time-consuming. Instead, the trained deep neural network (DNN) is developed to facilitate faster codeword selection. Simulation results show that the DNN maintains sub-optimal spectral efficiency even as the distance between the end-user and the RIS has variations in the testing phase. These results highlight the potential of DNN in advancing RIS-aided systems.

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arXiv2025

Deep Reinforcement Learning-Based Precoding for Multi-RIS-Aided Multiuser Downlink Systems with Practical Phase Shift

This study considers multiple reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs)-aided multiuser downlink systems with the goal of jointly optimizing the transmitter precoding and RIS phase shift matrix to maximize spectrum efficiency. Unlike prior work that assumed ideal RIS reflectivity, a practical coupling effect is considered between reflecting amplitude and phase shift for the RIS elements. This makes the optimization problem non-convex. To address this challenge, we propose a deep deterministic policy gradient (DDPG)-based deep reinforcement learning (DRL) framework. The proposed model is evaluated under both fixed and random numbers of users in practical mmWave channel settings. Simulation results demonstrate that, despite its complexity, the proposed DDPG approach significantly outperforms optimization-based algorithms and double deep Q-learning, particularly in scenarios with random user distributions.

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arXiv2022

Sensor Deployment and Link Analysis in Satellite IoT Systems for Wildfire Detection

Climate change has been identified as one of the most critical threats to human civilization and sustainability. Wildfires, which produce huge amounts of carbon emission, are both drivers and results of climate change. An early and timely wildfire detection system can constrain fires to short and small ones and yield significant carbon reduction. In this paper, we propose to use ground sensor deployment and satellite Internet of Things (IoT) technologies for wildfire detection by taking advantage of satellites' ubiquitous global coverage. We first develop an optimal IoT sensor placement strategy based on fire ignition and detection models. Then, we analyze the uplink satellite communication budget and the bandwidth required for wildfire detection under the narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) radio interface. Finally, we conduct simulations on the California wildfire database and quantify the potential economical benefits by factoring in carbon emission reductions and sensor/bandwidth costs.

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arXiv2022

Unsupervised Learning Based Hybrid Beamforming with Low-Resolution Phase Shifters for MU-MIMO Systems

Millimeter wave (mmWave) is a key technology for fifth-generation (5G) and beyond communications. Hybrid beamforming has been proposed for large-scale antenna systems in mmWave communications. Existing hybrid beamforming designs based on infinite-resolution phase shifters (PSs) are impractical due to hardware cost and power consumption. In this paper, we propose an unsupervised-learning-based scheme to jointly design the analog precoder and combiner with low-resolution PSs for multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) systems. We transform the analog precoder and combiner design problem into a phase classification problem and propose a generic neural network architecture, termed the phase classification network (PCNet), capable of producing solutions of various PS resolutions. Simulation results demonstrate the superior sum-rate and complexity performance of the proposed scheme, as compared to state-of-the-art hybrid beamforming designs for the most commonly used low-resolution PS configurations.

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arXiv2022

Few-Shot Transfer Learning for Device-Free Fingerprinting Indoor Localization

Device-free wireless indoor localization is an essential technology for the Internet of Things (IoT), and fingerprint-based methods are widely used. A common challenge to fingerprint-based methods is data collection and labeling. This paper proposes a few-shot transfer learning system that uses only a small amount of labeled data from the current environment and reuses a large amount of existing labeled data previously collected in other environments, thereby significantly reducing the data collection and labeling cost for localization in each new environment. The core method lies in graph neural network (GNN) based few-shot transfer learning and its modifications. Experimental results conducted on real-world environments show that the proposed system achieves comparable performance to a convolutional neural network (CNN) model, with 40 times fewer labeled data.

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arXiv2021

Sensor-Based Satellite IoT for Early Wildfire Detection

Frequent and severe wildfires have been observed lately on a global scale. Wildfires not only threaten lives and properties, but also pose negative environmental impacts that transcend national boundaries (e.g., greenhouse gas emission and global warming). Thus, early wildfire detection with timely feedback is much needed. We propose to use the emerging beyond fifth-generation (B5G) and sixth-generation (6G) satellite Internet of Things (IoT) communication technology to enable massive sensor deployment for wildfire detection. We propose wildfire and carbon emission models that take into account real environmental data including wind speed, soil wetness, and biomass, to simulate the fire spreading process and quantify the fire burning areas, carbon emissions, and economical benefits of the proposed system against the backdrop of recent California wildfires. We also conduct a satellite IoT feasibility check by analyzing the satellite link budget. Future research directions to further illustrate the promise of the proposed system are discussed.

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arXiv2021

Intelligent Reflecting Surfaces and Classical Relays: Coexistence and Co-Design

This paper investigates a multiuser downlink communication system with coexisting intelligent reflecting surface (IRS) and classical half-duplex decode-and-forward (DF) relay. In this system, the IRS and the DF relay interact with each other and assist transmission simultaneously. In particular, active beamforming at the base station (BS) and at the DF relay, and passive beamforming at the IRS, are jointly designed to maximize the sum-rate of all users. The sum-rate maximization problem is nonconvex due to the coupled beamforming vectors. We propose an alternating optimization (AO) based algorithm to tackle this complex co-design problem. Numerical validation and discussion on the superiority of the coexistence system and the tradeoffs therein are presented.

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arXiv2021

Deep Reinforcement Learning Aided Monte Carlo Tree Search for MIMO Detection

This paper proposes a novel multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) symbol detector that incorporates a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) agent into the Monte Carlo tree search (MCTS) detection algorithm. We first describe how the MCTS algorithm, used in many decision-making problems, is applied to the MIMO detection problem. Then, we introduce a self-designed deep reinforcement learning agent, consisting of a policy value network and a state value network, which is trained to detect MIMO symbols. The outputs of the trained networks are adopted into a modified MCTS detection algorithm to provide useful node statistics and facilitate enhanced tree search process. The resulted scheme, termed the DRL-MCTS detector, demonstrates significant improvements over the original MCTS detection algorithm and exhibits favorable performance compared to other existing linear and DNN-based detection methods under varying channel conditions.

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arXiv2020

Semi-Supervised Learning with GANs for Device-Free Fingerprinting Indoor Localization

Device-free wireless indoor localization is a key enabling technology for the Internet of Things (IoT). Fingerprint-based indoor localization techniques are a commonly used solution. This paper proposes a semi-supervised, generative adversarial network (GAN)-based device-free fingerprinting indoor localization system. The proposed system uses a small amount of labeled data and a large amount of unlabeled data (i.e., semi-supervised), thus considerably reducing the expensive data labeling effort. Experimental results show that, as compared to the state-of-the-art supervised scheme, the proposed semi-supervised system achieves comparable performance with equal, sufficient amount of labeled data, and significantly superior performance with equal, highly limited amount of labeled data. Besides, the proposed semi-supervised system retains its performance over a broad range of the amount of labeled data. The interactions between the generator, discriminator, and classifier models of the proposed GAN-based system are visually examined and discussed. A mathematical description of the proposed system is also presented.

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arXiv2019

Analysis and Visualization of Deep Neural Networks in Device-Free Wi-Fi Indoor Localization

Device-free Wi-Fi indoor localization has received significant attention as a key enabling technology for many Internet of Things (IoT) applications. Machine learning-based location estimators, such as the deep neural network (DNN), carry proven potential in achieving high-precision localization performance by automatically learning discriminative features from the noisy wireless signal measurements. However, the inner workings of DNNs are not transparent and not adequately understood especially in the indoor localization application. In this paper, we provide quantitative and visual explanations for the DNN learning process as well as the critical features that DNN has learned during the process. Toward this end, we propose to use several visualization techniques, including: 1) dimensionality reduction visualization, to project the high-dimensional feature space to the 2D space to facilitate visualization and interpretation, and 2) visual analytics and information visualization, to quantify relative contributions of each feature with the proposed feature manipulation procedures. The results provide insightful views and plausible explanations of the DNN in device-free Wi-Fi indoor localization using channel state information (CSI) fingerprints.

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arXiv2018

Distributed Multi-Stream Beamforming in MIMO Multi-Relay Interference Networks

In this paper, multi-stream transmission in interference networks aided by multiple amplify-and-forward (AF) relays in the presence of direct links is considered. The objective is to minimize the sum power of transmitters and relays by beamforming optimization under the stream signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio (SINR) constraints. For transmit beamforming optimization, the problem is a well-known non-convex quadratically constrained quadratic program (QCQP) that is NP-hard to solve. After semi-definite relaxation (SDR), the problem can be optimally solved via alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) algorithm for distributed implementation. Analytical and extensive numerical analyses demonstrate that the proposed ADMM solution converges to the optimal centralized solution. The convergence rate, computational complexity, and message exchange load of the proposed algorithm outperforms the existing solutions. Furthermore, by SINR approximation at the relay side, distributed joint transmit and relay beamforming optimization is also proposed that further improves the total power saving at the cost of increased complexity.

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arXiv2013

Symbol and Bit Mapping Optimization for Physical-Layer Network Coding with Pulse Amplitude Modulation

In this paper, we consider a two-way relay network in which two users exchange messages through a single relay using a physical-layer network coding (PNC) based protocol. The protocol comprises two phases of communication. In the multiple access (MA) phase, two users transmit their modulated signals concurrently to the relay, and in the broadcast (BC) phase, the relay broadcasts a network-coded (denoised) signal to both users. Nonbinary and binary network codes are considered for uniform and nonuniform pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) adopted in the MA phase, respectively. We examine the effect of different choices of symbol mapping (i.e., mapping from the denoised signal to the modulation symbols at the relay) and bit mapping (i.e., mapping from the modulation symbols to the source bits at the user) on the system error-rate performance. A general optimization framework is proposed to determine the optimal symbol/bit mappings with joint consideration of noisy transmissions in both communication phases. Complexity-reduction techniques are developed for solving the optimization problems. It is shown that the optimal symbol/bit mappings depend on the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the channel and the modulation scheme. A general strategy for choosing good symbol/bit mappings is also presented based on a high-SNR analysis, which suggests using a symbol mapping that aligns the error patterns in both communication phases and Gray and binary bit mappings for uniform and nonuniform PAM, respectively.

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arXiv2013

Energy Efficient Transmission over Space Shift Keying Modulated MIMO Channels

Energy-efficient communication using a class of spatial modulation (SM) that encodes the source information entirely in the antenna indices is considered in this paper. The energy-efficient modulation design is formulated as a convex optimization problem, where minimum achievable average symbol power consumption is derived with rate, performance, and hardware constraints. The theoretical result bounds any modulation scheme of this class, and encompasses the existing space shift keying (SSK), generalized SSK (GSSK), and Hamming code-aided SSK (HSSK) schemes as special cases. The theoretical optimum is achieved by the proposed practical energy-efficient HSSK (EE-HSSK) scheme that incorporates a novel use of the Hamming code and Huffman code techniques in the alphabet and bit-mapping designs. Experimental studies demonstrate that EE-HSSK significantly outperforms existing schemes in achieving near-optimal energy efficiency. An analytical exposition of key properties of the existing GSSK (including SSK) modulation that motivates a fundamental consideration for the proposed energy-efficient modulation design is also provided.

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