Abstract
Multiple input-multiple output (MIMO) is a key enabling technology for the next generation of wireless communication systems. However, one of the main challenges in the implementation of MIMO system is the complexity of the detectors when the number of antennas increases. This aspect will be crucial in the implementation of future massive MIMO systems. A flexible design can offer a convenient tradeoff between detection complexity and bit error rate (BER). Deep learning (DL) has emerged as an efficient method for solving optimization problems in different areas. In MIMO communication systems, neural networks can provide efficient and innovative solutions. This paper presents an efficient DL-based signal detection strategy for MIMO communication systems. More specifically, a preprocessing stage is added to label the input signals. The labeling scheme provides more information about the transmitted symbols for better training. Based on this strategy, two novel schemes are proposed and evaluated considering BER performance and detection complexity. The performance of the proposed schemes is compared with the conventional one-hot (OH) scheme and the optimal maximum likelihood (ML) criterion. The results show that the proposed OH per antenna (OHA) and direct symbol encoding (DSE) schemes reach a classification performance F1-score of 0.97. Both schemes present a lower complexity compared with the conventional OH and the ML schemes, used as references. On the other hand, the OHA and DSE schemes have losses of less than 1 dB and 2 dB in BER performance, respectively, compared to the OH scheme. The proposed strategy can be applied to adaptive systems where computational resources are limited.