Optimum Performance of Self-Adaptive Systems Operating Through a Rayleigh-Fading Medium

Considerable attention has been given in the past to the design and specification of optimum (a posteriori probability computer) receivers. In this paper we consider the problem of communicating through the Rayleigh-Fading-Multipath channel with additive noise. The a posteriori probabilities necessary for specifying different receiver modes for various forms of a priori channel knowledge are derived. System performance is analyzed and computed for several modes of operation and the results presented in graphical form, allowing one to determine the importance of making measurements on the unknown channel state.