Massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) is a key technique for fifth-generation (5G) and beyond communications. Therefore, accurate characterization of the responses of the large-scale antenna arrays at an arbitrary direction is critical. The effective aperture distribution function (EADF) can provide an analytic description of an antenna array based on a full-sphere measurement of the array in an anechoic chamber. However, as the aperture of an array becomes significantly larger, application of the EADF requires very dense spatial samples due to the large distance-offsets of the array elements to the reference point in the anechoic chamber. This leads to a prohibitive measurement time and a high computational complexity of EADF. In this paper, we first present the EADF applied to large-scale arrays, followed by an analytical analysis of the issue caused by the large array aperture. To solve this issue, an enhanced low-complexity EADF is proposed with a low complexity that is only considering the intrinsic characteristics of each array element rather than the aperture size of the array. Moreover, a measurement campaign conducted at the frequency band of 27-30\,GHz using a relatively large planar array is introduced, where the proposed enhanced EADF is applied and validated.

中文翻译：

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用于表征大型天线阵列的增强型 EADF

大规模多输入多输出 (MIMO) 是第五代 (5G) 及以后通信的关键技术。因此，准确表征大规模天线阵列在任意方向的响应至关重要。有效孔径分布函数 (EADF) 可以基于对消声室中阵列的全球面测量来提供对天线阵列的分析描述。然而，随着阵列的孔径变得显着增大，由于阵列元件到电波暗室中的参考点的距离偏移很大，EADF 的应用需要非常密集的空间样本。这导致 EADF 的测量时间过长和计算复杂度高。在本文中，我们首先介绍了应用于大规模阵列的 EADF，接着对大阵列孔径引起的问题进行了分析分析。为了解决这个问题，提出了一种增强的低复杂度EADF，其复杂度低，只考虑每个阵列元件的内在特性，而不是阵列的孔径大小。此外，还介绍了使用相对较大的平面阵列在 27-30GHz 频段进行的测量活动，其中应用并验证了所提出的增强型 EADF。