Analysis of Indoor THz Communication Systems With Finite-Bit DACs and ADCs

Terahertz (THz) communication is foreseen to be a key technology for the 6G wireless communications. In this paper, the performance of downlink Terahertz (THz) communication systems with low-resolution digital-to-analog converters (DACs) at the Access Point (AP) and/or finite-bit analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) at the user sides are investigated. Array-of-subarrays architecture is assumed at the AP, where each RF chain uniquely activates a disjoint subset of antennas, each of which is connected to an exclusive phase shifter. Hybrid precodings including maximum ratio transmission (MRT) and zero-forcing (ZF) precoding are considered. The best beamsteering direction for the phase shifters in the large subarray antenna regime is first proved to be the direction of the line-of-sight (LOS) path. Subsequently, the closed-form expression of the lower-bound of the achievable rate in the large subarray antenna regime is derived, which is the same for both MRT and ZF and is independent of the transmit power. Moreover, numerical results show that the rate loss caused by the phase uncertainties can be negligible in large subarray antenna regime and moderate resolution DACs and ADCs can achieve performance close to the infinite-resolution one. Numerical results validating the analysis are provided as well. Overall, the impact of finite-bit precoding and finite-bit ADCs on the achievable rate of indoor THz communication systems is characterized.