Two-Phase Channel Estimation for RIS-Assisted THz Systems with Beam Split

Abstract

Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-assisted terahertz (THz) communication is emerging as a key technology to support ultra-high data rates in future sixth-generation networks. However, the acquisition of accurate channel state information (CSI) in such systems is challenging due to the passive nature of RIS and the hybrid beamforming architecture typically employed in THz systems. To address these challenges, we propose a novel low-complexity two-phase channel estimation scheme for RIS-assisted THz systems with beam split effect. In the proposed scheme, we first estimate the full CSI over a small subset of subcarriers, then extract angular information at both the base station and RIS. Subsequently, we recover the full CSI across remaining subcarriers by determining the corresponding spatial directions and angle-excluded coefficients. Theoretical analysis and simulation results demonstrate that the proposed method achieves superior performance in terms of normalized mean-square error while significantly reducing computational complexity compared to existing algorithms.