Nonparametric multiuser detection in non-Gaussian channels

Existing multiuser detection techniques in wireless systems are based on the assumption that some information on the parameters of the probability density function (pdf) of ambient noise is available. Such information may not be available in all cases, particularly for non-Gaussian and impulsive noises, or may change depending on circumstances. In this paper, we present a technique for multiuser detection that does not require any a priori knowledge about the noise parameters. This method is based on using pseudo norms for linear nonparametric regression. Analytical and simulation results show that the proposed method offers an improved, or at least comparable, performance over existing robust techniques in the absence of any information on the nature of noise in the environment. The increased computational complexity is marginal compared to existing parametric detectors. In addition, the proposed nonparametric detector is portable in the sense that it does not need to be tuned for different noise models without any considerable degradation of performance. We also show that in non-Gaussian noise, the performance of blind adaptive nonparametric multiuser detectors is better than that of robust multiuser detectors.