Channel Tracking for Future Powerline-based Full-Duplex Smart Grid Communication Networks

Development trends in Smart Grids are focused on high-speed, reliable, secure, and bidirectional data communication. Power line communication (PLC), as a mature, low cost and reliable communication technology, has a great potential to be used in future Smart Grid networks. Recent research activity in In-band full-duplex (IBFD) for broadband PLC (BB-PLC) makes PLC even more attractive for Smart Grids. IBFD can improve spectral efficiency and data rates of a communication system. However, implementation of IBFD for BB-PLC is highly challenging due to the harsh nature of PLC channels. Besides the necessity of estimation and cancellation of self-interference (SI) signals, it is also essential to track channels and adapt to their changes. This paper compares two channel tracking algorithms suitable for implementing IBFD-enabled 2-by-2 multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) BB-PLC with an analog interference cancellation (AIC) stage. We compare our approach, which is based on Linear Joint Estimation (LJE), with the classical Least Mean Square (LMS) algorithm. First, we define the optimal values (regions) for the parameters of two algorithms separately for five different channel sets. Then, we choose optimized values for each algorithm and use them for further simulations. The tracking ability of the algorithms is evaluated using the average error vector magnitude (AEVM) and the power of the residual self-interference (RSI). Both algorithms show similar performance in the analyzed 2x2 MIMO channel sets; however, the LJE algorithm is less sensitive to the wrong selection of parameters with the respect to the optimal ones.