Non-reciprocal Beyond Diagonal RIS: Sum-Rate Maximization in Full-Duplex Communications

Abstract: Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) has been envisioned as a key technology in future wireless communication networks to enable smart radio environment. To further enhance the passive beamforming capability of RIS, beyond diagonal (BD)-RIS has been proposed considering reconfigurable interconnections among different RIS elements. BD-RIS has a unique feature that cannot be enabled by conventional diagonal RIS; it can be realized by non-reciprocal circuits and thus enables an asymmetric scattering matrix. This feature provides the capability to break the wireless channel reciprocity, and has the potential to benefit full-duplex (FD) systems. In this paper, we model the BD RIS-assisted FD systems, where the impact of BD-RIS non-reciprocity and that of structural scattering, which refers to the specular reflection generated by RIS when the RIS is turned OFF, are explicitly captured. To assess the benefits of non-reciprocal BD-RIS, we optimise the scattering matrix, precoder and combiner to maximize the DL and UL sum-rates in the FD system. To tackle this optimization problem, we propose an iterative algorithm based on block coordination descent (BCD) and penalty dual decomposition (PDD). Numerical results demonstrate surprising benefits of non-reciprocal BD-RIS that it can achieve much higher DL and UL sum-rates in the FD scenario than reciprocal BD-RIS and conventional diagonal RIS.