Modulation options for OFDM-based waveforms: classification, comparison, and future directions

This paper provides a comparative study on the performance of different modulation options for orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) in terms of their spectral efficiency, reliability, peak-to-average power ratio, power efficiency, out-of-band emission, and computational complexity. The modulation candidates are classified into two main categories based on the signal plane dimension they exploit. These categories are: 1) 2-D signal plane category including conventional OFDM with classical fixed or adaptive QAM modulation and OFDM with differential modulation, where information is conveyed in changes between two successive symbols in the same subcarrier or between two consecutive subcarriers in the same OFDM symbol and 2) 3-D signal plane category encompassing: a) index-based OFDM modulation schemes which include: i) spatial modulation OFDM, where information is sent by the indices of antennas along with conventional modulated symbols and ii) OFDM with index modulation, where the subcarriers’ indices are used to send additional information; b) number-based OFDM modulation schemes which include OFDM with subcarrier number modulation, in which number of subcarriers is exploited to convey additional information; and c) shape-based OFDM modulation schemes which include OFDM with pulse superposition modulation, where the shape of pulses is introduced as a third new dimension to convey additional information. Based on the provided comparative study, the relationship and interaction between these different modulation options and the requirements of future 5G networks are discussed and explained. This paper is then concluded with some recommendations and future research directions.This work was supported in part by the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK), under Grant 215E316

Multi-sinusoidal waveform shaping for integrated data and energy transfer in aging channels

Integrated data and energy transfer (IDET) is capable of simultaneously delivering on-demand data and energy to low-power Internet of Everything (IoE) devices. We propose a multi-carrier IDET transceiver relying on superposition waveforms consisting of multi-sinusoidal signals for wireless energy transfer (WET) and orthogonal-frequency-division-multiplexing (OFDM) signals for wireless data transfer (WDT). The outdated channel state information (CSI) in aging channels is employed by the transmitter to shape IDET waveforms. With the constraints of transmission power and WDT requirement, the amplitudes and phases of the IDET waveform at the transmitter and the power splitter at the receiver are jointly optimised for maximising the average direct-current (DC) among a limited number of transmission frames with the existence of carrier-frequency-offset (CFO). For the amplitude optimisation, the original non-convex problem can be transformed into a reversed geometric programming problem, then it can be effectively solved with existing tools. As for the phase optimisation, the artificial bee colony (ABC) algorithm is invoked in order to deal with the non-convexity. Iteration between the amplitude optimisation and phase optimisation yields our joint design. Numerical results demonstrate the advantage of our joint design for the IDET waveform shaping with the existence of the CFO and the outdated CSI

Design and Analysis of OFDM System for Powerline Based Communication

Research on digital communication systems has been greatly developed in the past few years and offers a high quality of transmission in both wired and wireless communication environments. Coupled with advances in new modulation techniques, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is a well-known digital multicarrier communication technique and one of the best methods of digital data transmission over a limited bandwidth. The main aim of this research is to design an OFDM modem for powerline-based communication in order to propose and examine a novel approach in comparing the different modulation order, different modulation type, application of Forward Error Correction (FEC) scheme and also application of different noise types and applying them to the two modelled channels, Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) and Powerline modelled channel. This is an attempt to understand and recognise the most suitable technique for the transmission of message or image within a communication system. In doing so, MATLAB and embedded Digital Signal Processing (DSP) systems are used to simulate the operation of virtual transmitter and receiver. The simulation results presented in this project suggest that lower order modulation formats (Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK) and 4-Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM)), are the most preferred modulation techniques (in both type and order) for their considerable performance. The results also indicated that, Convolutional Channel Encoding (CCE)-Soft and Block Channel Encoding (BCE)-Soft are by far the best encoding techniques (in FEC type) for their best performance in error detection and correction. Indeed, applying these techniques to the two modelled channels has proven very successful and will be accounted as a novel approach for the transmission of message or image within a powerline based communication system

Companding and Predistortion Techniques for Improved Efficiency and Performance in SWIPT

In this work, we analyze how the use of companding techniques, together with digital predistortion (DPD), can be leveraged to improve system efficiency and performance in simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) systems based on power splitting. By taking advantage of the benefits of each of these well-known techniques to mitigate non-linear effects due to power amplifier (PA) and energy harvesting (EH) operation, we illustrate how DPD and companding can be effectively combined to improve the EH efficiency while keeping unalterable the information transfer performance. We establish design criteria that allow the PA to operate in a higher efficiency region so that the reduction in peak-to-average power ratio over the transmitted signal is translated into an increase in the average radiated power and EH efficiency. The performance of DPD and companding techniques is evaluated in a number of scenarios, showing that a combination of both techniques allows to significantly increase the power transfer efficiency in SWIPT systems.Comment: This work has been submitted to the IEEE for possible publication. Copyright may be transferred without notice, after which this version may no longer be accessibl

mm-Wave Data Transmission and Measurement Techniques: A Holistic Approach

The ever-increasing demand on data services places unprecedented technical requirements on networks capacity. With wireless systems having significant roles in broadband delivery, innovative approaches to their development are imperative. By leveraging new spectral resources available at millimeter-wave (mm-wave) frequencies, future systems can utilize new signal structures and new system architectures in order to achieve long-term sustainable solutions.This thesis proposes the holistic development of efficient and cost-effective techniques and systems which make high-speed data transmission at mm-wave feasible. In this paradigm, system designs, signal processing, and measurement techniques work toward a single goal; to achieve satisfactory system level key performance indicators (KPIs). Two intimately-related objectives are simultaneously addressed: the realization of efficient mm-wave data transmission and the development of measurement techniques to enable and assist the design and evaluation of mm-wave circuits.The standard approach to increase spectral efficiency is to increase the modulation order at the cost of higher transmission power. To improve upon this, a signal structure called spectrally efficient frequency division multiplexing (SEFDM) is utilized. SEFDM adds an additional dimension of continuously tunable spectral efficiency enhancement. Two new variants of SEFDM are implemented and experimentally demonstrated, where both variants are shown to outperform standard signals.A low-cost low-complexity mm-wave transmitter architecture is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. A simple phase retarder predistorter and a frequency multiplier are utilized to successfully generate spectrally efficient mm-wave signals while simultaneously mitigating various issues found in conventional mm-wave systems.A measurement technique to characterize circuits and components under antenna array mutual coupling effects is proposed and demonstrated. With minimal setup requirement, the technique effectively and conveniently maps prescribed transmission scenarios to the measurement environment and offers evaluations of the components in terms of relevant KPIs in addition to conventional metrics.Finally, a technique to estimate transmission and reflection coefficients is proposed and demonstrated. In one variant, the technique enables the coefficients to be estimated using wideband modulated signals, suitable for implementation in measurements performed under real usage scenarios. In another variant, the technique enhances the precision of noisy S-parameter measurements, suitable for characterizations of wideband mm-wave components

Mode Coupling in Space-division Multiplexed Systems

Even though fiber-optic communication systems have been engineered to nearly approach the Shannon capacity limit, they still cannot meet the exponentially-growing bandwidth demand of the Internet. Space-division multiplexing (SDM) has attracted considerable attention in recent years due to its potential to address this capacity crunch. In SDM, the transmission channels support more than one spatial mode, each of which can provide the same capacity as a single-mode fiber. To make SDM practical, crosstalk among modes must be effectively managed. This dissertation presents three techniques for crosstalk management for SDM. In some cases such as intra-datacenter interconnects, even though mode crosstalk cannot be completely avoided, crosstalk among mode groups can be suppressed in properly-designed few-mode fibers to support mode group-multiplexed transmission. However, in most cases, mode coupling is unavoidable. In free-space optical (FSO) communication, mode coupling due to turbulence manifests as wavefront distortions. Since there is almost no modal dispersion in FSO, we demonstrate the use of few-mode pre-amplified receivers to mitigate the effect of turbulence without using adaptive optics. In fiber-optic communication, multi-mode fibers or long-haul few-mode fibers not only suffer from mode crosstalk but also large modal dispersion, which can only be compensated electronically using multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) digital signal processing (DSP). In this case, we take the counterintuitive approach of introducing strong mode coupling to reduce modal group delay and DSP complexity

A hybrid-structure offset-QAM filter-bank multi-carrier MIMO system

Offset quadrature amplitude modulation (OQAM) filter-bank multi-carrier (FBMC), has great potential for boosting the spectral efficiency (SE) and energy efficiency (EE) of future communication systems. This is due to its superior spectral localization, CP-less transmission and relaxed synchronization requirements. Our research focuses on three main OQAM/FBMC research problems: the computational complexity reduction taking equalization into consideration, its integration with multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) and its high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR). OQAM/FBMC systems are mainly implemented either using frequency spreading (FS) or polyphase network (PPN) techniques. The PPN technique is generally less complex, but when using frequency domain equalization (FDE) to equalize multipath channel effects at the receiver, there is a computational complexity overhead when using PPN. A novel hybrid-structure OQAM/FBMC MIMO space-frequency block coding (SFBC) system is proposed, to achieve the lowest possible overall complexity in conjunction with FDE at the receiver in frequency selective Rayleigh fading channel. The Alamouti SFBC block coding is performed on the complex-orthogonal signal before OQAM processing, which resolves the problems of intrinsic interference when integrating OQAM/FBMC with MIMO. In better multipath channel conditions with a line-of-sight (LOS) path, a zero-forcing (ZF) time domain equalization (TDE) is exploited to further reduce the computational complexity with comparable performance bit-error-rate (BER). On the other hand, to tackle the high PAPR problem of the OQAM/FBMC system in the uplink, a novel single carrier (SC)-OQAM/FBMC MIMO system is proposed. The system uses DFT-spreading applied to the OQAM modulated signal, along with interleaved subcarrier mapping to significantly reduce the PAPR and enhance the BER performance over Rayleigh fading channels, with relatively low additional computational complexity compared to the original complexity of the FBMC system and compared to other FBMC PAPR reduction techniques.The proposed hybrid-structure system has shown significant BER performance in frequency-selective Rayleigh fading channels compared to OFDM, with significantly lower OOB emissions in addition to the enhanced SE due to the absence of CP. In mild multipath fading channels with a LOS component, the PPN OQAM/FBMC MIMO using TDE has a comparable BER performance with significantly less computational complexity. As for the uplink, the SC-OQAM/FBMC MIMO system significantly reduces the PAPR and enhances the BER performance, with relatively low additional computational complexity