Effect of the Polarization Diversity on the DOA Estimation using Multiple Antennas

Communication systems employing any kind of diversity scheme can provide valuable advantages for improving power reception and increasing multiplexing and diversity gain. In this paper, single and dual-polarized arrays are used for DoA (direction-of-arrival) estimation using multiple antennas at the receiver side. Polarization diversity at the received side increases the sensitivity for receiving power coming from different directions. This diversity scheme partially resolves the effect caused by the depolarization losses that suffer signals due to the interaction with the existing scatters in the environment. DoA estimations using polarization information are presented and compared to analyze the effect of depolarization losses in indoor environments. An extended version of the common well-known MUSIC algorithm to manage two polarization components was used.