Beam division multiple access for massive MIMO downlink transmission

We study a multiuser multicarrier downlink communication system in which the base station (BS) employs a large number of antennas. By assuming frequency-division duplex operation, we provide a beam domain channel model as the number of BS antennas grows asymptotically large. With this model, we first derive a closed-form upper bound on the achievable ergodic sum-rate before developing necessary conditions to asymptotically maximize the upper bound, with only statistical channel state information at the BS. Inspired by these conditions, we propose a beam division multiple access (BDMA) transmission scheme, where the BS communicates with users via different beams. For BDMA transmission, we design user scheduling to select users within non-overlapping beams, work out an optimal pilot design under a minimum mean square error criterion, and provide optimal pilot sequences by utilizing the Zadoff-Chu sequences. The proposed BDMA scheme reduces significantly the pilot overhead, as well as, the processing complexity at transceivers. Simulations demonstrate the high spectral efficiency of BDMA transmission and the advantages in the bit error rate performance of the proposed pilot sequences.

Wireless Networks with Energy Harvesting and Power Transfer: Joint Power and Time Allocation

In this letter, we consider wireless powered communication networks which could operate perpetually, as the base station (BS) broadcasts energy to the multiple energy harvesting (EH) information transmitters. These employ “harvest then transmit” mechanism, as they spend all of their energy harvested during the previous BS energy broadcast to transmit the information towards the BS. Assuming time division multiple access (TDMA), we propose a novel transmission scheme for jointly optimal allocation of the BS broadcasting power and time sharing among the wireless nodes, which maximizes the overall network throughput, under the constraint of average transmit power and maximum transmit power at the BS. The proposed scheme significantly outperforms “state of the art” schemes that employ only the optimal time allocation. If a single EH transmitter is considered, we generalize the optimal solutions for the case of fixed circuit power consumption, which refers to a much more practical scenario.

RF energy harvesting two-way cognitive DF relaying with transceiver impairments

This paper analyzes the impact of transceiver impairments on outage probability (OP) and throughput of decode-and-forward two-way cognitive relay (TWCR) networks, where the relay is self-powered by harvesting energy from the transmitted signals. We consider two bidirectional relaying protocols namely, multiple access broadcast (MABC) protocol and time division broadcast (TDBC) protocol, as well as, two power transfer policies namely, dual-source (DS) energy transfer and single-fixed-source (SFS) energy transfer. Closed-form expressions for OP and throughput of the network are derived in the context of delay-limited transmission. Numerical results corroborate our analysis, thereby we can quantify the degradation of OP and throughput of TWCR networks due to transceiver hardware impairments. Under the specific parameters, our results indicate that the MABC protocol achieves asymptotically a higher throughput by 0.65 [bits/s/Hz] than the TDBC protocol, while the DS energy transfer scheme offers better performance than the SFS policy for both relaying protocols.

Application of self-quenched JH consensus primers for real-time quantitative PCR of IGH gene to minimal residual disease evaluation in multiple myeloma.

Monitoring multiple myeloma patients for relapse requires sensitive methods to measure minimal residual disease and to establish a more precise prognosis. The present study aimed to standardize a real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for the IgH gene with a JH consensus self-quenched fluorescence reverse primer and a VDJH or DJH allele-specific sense primer (self-quenched PCR). This method was compared with allele-specific real-time quantitative PCR test for the IgH gene using a TaqMan probe and a JH consensus primer (TaqMan PCR). We studied nine multiple myeloma patients from the Spanish group treated with the MM2000 therapeutic protocol. Self-quenched PCR demonstrated sensitivity of >or=10(-4) or 16 genomes in most cases, efficiency was 1.71 to 2.14, and intra-assay and interassay reproducibilities were 1.18 and 0.75%, respectively. Sensitivity, efficiency, and residual disease detection were similar with both PCR methods. TaqMan PCR failed in one case because of a mutation in the JH primer binding site, and self-quenched PCR worked well in this case. In conclusion, self-quenched PCR is a sensitive and reproducible method for quantifying residual disease in multiple myeloma patients; it yields similar results to TaqMan PCR and may be more effective than the latter when somatic mutations are present in the JH intronic primer binding site.

Minimal residual disease monitoring in multiple myeloma: a comparison between allelic-specific oligonucleotide real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction and flow cytometry.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Minimal residual disease (MRD) studies are useful in multiple myeloma (MM). However, the definition of the best technique and clinical utility are still unresolved issues. The aim of this study was to analyze and compare the clinical utility of MRD studies in MM with two different techniques: allelic-specific oligonucleotide real-time quantitative PCR (ASO-RQ-PCR), and flow cytometry (FCM). DESIGN AND METHODS: Bone marrow samples from 32 MM patients who had achieved complete response after transplantation were evaluated by ASO-RQ-PCR, using TaqMan technology, and multiparametric FCM. RESULTS: ASO-RQ-PCR was only applicable in 75% of patients for a variety of technical reasons, while FCM was applicable in up to 90%. Therefore, simultaneous PCR/FCM analysis was possible in only 24 patients. The number of residual tumor cells identified by both techniques was very similar (mean=0.29%, range=0.001-1.61%, correlation coefficient=0.861). However, RQ-PCR was able to detect residual myelomatous cells in 17 patients while FCM only did so in 11; thus, 6 cases were FCM negative but PCR positive, all of them displaying a very low number of clonal cells (median=0.014%, range=0.001-0.11). Using an MRD threshold of 0.01% (10(-4)) two risk groups with significantly different progression-free survival could be identified by either PCR (34 vs. 15m, p=0.04) or FCM (27 vs. 10m, p=0.05). INTERPRETATION AND CONCLUSIONS: Although MRD evaluation by ASO-RQ-PCR is slightly more sensitive and specific than FCM, it is applicable in a lower proportion of MM patients and is more time-consuming, while both techniques provide similar prognostic information.

Incomplete DJH rearrangements as a novel tumor target for minimal residual disease quantitation in multiple myeloma using real-time PCR.

The hypervariable regions of immunoglobulin heavy-chain (IgH) rearrangements provide a specific tumor marker in multiple myeloma (MM). Recently, real-time PCR assays have been developed in order to quantify the number of tumor cells after treatment. However, these strategies are hampered by the presence of somatic hypermutation (SH) in VDJH rearrangements from multiple myeloma (MM) patients, which causes mismatches between primers and/or probes and the target, leading to a nonaccurate quantification of tumor cells. Our group has recently described a 60% incidence of incomplete DJH rearrangements in MM patients, with no or very low rates of SH. In this study, we compare the efficiency of a real-time PCR approach for the analysis of both complete and incomplete IgH rearrangements in eight MM patients using only three JH consensus probes. We were able to design an allele-specific oligonucleotide for both the complete and incomplete rearrangement in all patients. DJH rearrangements fulfilled the criteria of effectiveness for real-time PCR in all samples (ie no unspecific amplification, detection of less than 10 tumor cells within 10(5) polyclonal background and correlation coefficients of standard curves higher than 0.98). By contrast, only three out of eight VDJH rearrangements fulfilled these criteria. Further analyses showed that the remaining five VDJH rearrangements carried three or more somatic mutations in the probe and primer sites, leading to a dramatic decrease in the melting temperature. These results support the use of incomplete DJH rearrangements instead of complete somatically mutated VDJH rearrangements for investigation of minimal residual disease in multiple myeloma.