Patent ID: 8681909

Claim:
A maximum likelihood decoding method of separating received signals received by a plurality of antennas into a plurality of transmission signals, using a maximum likelihood decoding apparatus, comprising the steps of: a first step of arranging channel impulse responses corresponding to the received signals in a plurality of different orders; a second step of specifying a same number of parts as the plurality of different orders in which the channel impulse responses are arranged, wherein the received signals are placed in each of the parts; a third step of generating channel matrices each having the channel impulse responses as matrix elements, by using the channel impulse responses arranged in the plurality of different orders, obtaining triangular matrices by applying QR decomposition to the generated channel matrices, and determining at least one combination candidate for each of parts of the plurality of transmission signals by using the obtained triangular matrices; and a fourth step of selecting the combination candidates so that a Euclidean distance between the combination candidates determined in the third step is shortest; wherein: in the first step, the channel impulse responses corresponding to the received signals are arranged in a first order and in a second order that is different from the first order; in the second step, a first part and a second part are specified, wherein the received signals are placed in the first part and the second part; the third step includes the steps of: generating a channel matrix having the channel impulse responses as matrix elements by using the channel impulse responses arranged in the first order, obtaining a triangular matrix by applying the QR decomposition to the generated channel matrix, and determining at least one combination candidate for a first part of the plurality of transmission signals by using the obtained triangular matrix; and generating a channel matrix having the channel impulse responses as the matrix elements by using the channel impulse responses arranged in the second order, obtaining a triangular matrix by applying the QR decomposition to the generated channel matrix, and determining at least one combination candidate for a second part of the plurality of transmission signals by using the obtained triangular matrix; and in the fourth step, the combination candidate for the first part and the combination candidate for the second part are selected so that the Euclidean distance between the combination candidate for the first part and the combination candidate for the second part is shortest; wherein, values of lower right diagonal terms of the obtained triangular matrices are compared; a pair of orders for arranging the channel impulse responses is specified in such an order that the absolute value of a lower right diagonal term of the compared obtained triangular matrices is largest; and the orders constituting the specified pair of the orders are specified as the first order and the second order of the first step.