Patent ID: 7620128

Claim:
A method for decoding a set of M signals received at a base station from a plurality of cell phones that transmit on a given channel, characterized by the step of: processing said M signals, received over L time intervals, where L is an integer, which signals are related to channel coefficients between transmitting points of said cell phones and the base station, to cancel interference from K of said cell phones, where M and K are integers such that M≧2 and K≦M, and to identity signals that likely were transmitted by said cell phones through maximum likelihood detection where said canceling of interference and maximum likelihood detection is performed by minimizing expression that corresponds to a magnitude of said received signals multiplied by selected coefficients α and subtracted from probable symbols sent by a selected one of said cell phones multiplied by selected coefficients β, where said α coefficients are related to channel coefficients of said cell phones and to channel coefficients of said selected one of said cell phones, and at least one of the β coefficients is set to 1.