Performance analysis and optimization of DCT-based multicarrier system on frequency-selective fading channels

Regarded as one of the most promising transmission techniques for future wireless communications, the discrete cosine transform (DCT) based multicarrier modulation (MCM) system employs cosine basis as orthogonal functions for real-modulated symbols multiplexing, by which the minimum orthogonal frequency spacing can be reduced by half compared to discrete Fourier transform (DFT) based one. With a time-reversed pre-filter employed at the front of the receiver, interference-free one-tap equalization is achievable for the DCT-based systems. However, due to the correlated pre-filtering operation in time domain, the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is enhanced as a result at the output. This leads to reformulated detection criterion to compensate for such filtering effect, rendering minimum-mean-square-error (MMSE) and maximum likelihood (ML) detections applicable to the DCT-based multicarrier system. In this paper, following on the pre-filtering based DCT-MCM model that build in the literature work, we extend the overall system by considering both transceiver perfections and imperfections, where frequency offset, time offset and insufficient guard sequence are included. In the presence of those imperfection errors, the DCT-MCM systems are analysed in terms of desired signal power, inter-carrier interference (ICI) and inter-symbol interference (ISI). Thereafter, new detection algorithms based on zero forcing (ZF) iterative results are proposed to mitigate the imperfection effect. Numerical results show that the theoretical analysis match the simulation results, and the proposed iterative detection algorithms are able to improve the overall system performance significantly

Analysis and mitigation of carrier frequency offset for uplink of OFDMA

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is being used in many wireless standards because of its immunity to multipath fading, high spectral efficiency and simple implementation, making it suitable for high data rate multimedia wireless applications. One of the significant drawbacks of the OFDM is its sensitivity to Carrier Frequency Offset (CFO). CFO causes Inter Carrier Interference (ICI) between subcarriers and Multiple User Interference (MUI) at Uplink between different users. ICI and MUI at uplink cause significant degradation in the performance of the receiver, therefore, to improve the receiver performance up to acceptable level, compensation of the CFO becomes necessary. In this research, Suppression of MUI by Minimum Mean Squared Error (MMSE) Feedback Equalizer in frequency domain which was originally proposed for Single Carrier- Frequency Domain Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) has been studied for Uplink of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA). However, calculation of MUI power required in this algorithm for all users impose very high computational burden on the receiver. In the proposed Low Complexity MUI Suppression by MMSE Equalization for Uplink of OFDMA approximation to the calculation of MUI power is applied to reduce its complexity. Simulation result & calculated complexity show that proposed method obtains good performance with much lower complexity

Frequency-domain receiver design for doubly-selective channels

This work is devoted to the broadband wireless transmission techniques, which are serious candidates to be implemented in future broadband wireless and cellular systems, aiming at providing high and reliable data transmission and concomitantly high mobility. In order to cope with doubly-selective channels, receiver structures based on OFDM and SC-FDE block transmission techniques, are proposed, which allow cost-effective implementations, using FFT-based signal processing. The first subject to be addressed is the impact of the number of multipath components, and the diversity order, on the asymptotic performance of OFDM and SC-FDE, in uncoded and for different channel coding schemes. The obtained results show that the number of relevant separable multipath components is a key element that influences the performance of OFDM and SC-FDE schemes. Then, the improved estimation and detection performance of OFDM-based broadcasting systems, is introduced employing SFN (Single Frequency Network) operation. An initial coarse channel is obtained with resort to low-power training sequences estimation, and an iterative receiver with joint detection and channel estimation is presented. The achieved results have shown very good performance, close to that with perfect channel estimation. The next topic is related to SFN systems, devoting special attention to time-distortion effects inherent to these networks. Typically, the SFN broadcast wireless systems employ OFDM schemes to cope with severely time-dispersive channels. However, frequency errors, due to CFO, compromises the orthogonality between subcarriers. As an alternative approach, the possibility of using SC-FDE schemes (characterized by reduced envelope fluctuations and higher robustness to carrier frequency errors) is evaluated, and a technique, employing joint CFO estimation and compensation over the severe time-distortion effects, is proposed. Finally, broadband mobile wireless systems, in which the relative motion between the transmitter and receiver induces Doppler shift which is different or each propagation path, is considered, depending on the angle of incidence of that path in relation to the direction of travel. This represents a severe impairment in wireless digital communications systems, since that multipath propagation combined with the Doppler effects, lead to drastic and unpredictable fluctuations of the envelope of the received signal, severely affecting the detection performance. The channel variations due this effect are very difficult to estimate and compensate. In this work we propose a set of SC-FDE iterative receivers implementing efficient estimation and tracking techniques. The performance results show that the proposed receivers have very good performance, even in the presence of significant Doppler spread between the different groups of multipath components

Frequency Domain Independent Component Analysis Applied To Wireless Communications Over Frequency-selective Channels

In wireless communications, frequency-selective fading is a major source of impairment for wireless communications. In this research, a novel Frequency-Domain Independent Component Analysis (ICA-F) approach is proposed to blindly separate and deconvolve signals traveling through frequency-selective, slow fading channels. Compared with existing time-domain approaches, the ICA-F is computationally efficient and possesses fast convergence properties. Simulation results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed ICA-F. Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) systems are widely used in wireless communications nowadays. However, OFDM systems are very sensitive to Carrier Frequency Offset (CFO). Thus, an accurate CFO compensation technique is required in order to achieve acceptable performance. In this dissertation, two novel blind approaches are proposed to estimate and compensate for CFO within the range of half subcarrier spacing: a Maximum Likelihood CFO Correction approach (ML-CFOC), and a high-performance, low-computation Blind CFO Estimator (BCFOE). The Bit Error Rate (BER) improvement of the ML-CFOC is achieved at the expense of a modest increase in the computational requirements without sacrificing the system bandwidth or increasing the hardware complexity. The BCFOE outperforms the existing blind CFO estimator [25, 128], referred to as the YG-CFO estimator, in terms of BER and Mean Square Error (MSE), without increasing the computational complexity, sacrificing the system bandwidth, or increasing the hardware complexity. While both proposed techniques outperform the YG-CFO estimator, the BCFOE is better than the ML-CFOC technique. Extensive simulation results illustrate the performance of the ML-CFOC and BCFOE approaches

Purposeful Co-Design of OFDM Signals for Ranging and Communications

This paper analyzes the fundamental trade-offs that occur in the co-design of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing signals for both ranging (via time-of-arrival estimation) and communications. These trade-offs are quantified through the Shannon capacity bound, probability of outage, and the Ziv-Zakai bound on range estimation variance. Bounds are derived for signals experiencing frequency-selective Rayleigh block fading, accounting for the impact of limited channel knowledge and multi-antenna reception. Uncompensated carrier frequency offset and phase errors are also factored into the capacity bounds. Analysis based on the derived bounds demonstrates how Pareto-optimal design choices can be made to optimize the communication throughput, probability of outage, and ranging variance. Different signal design strategies are then analyzed, showing how Pareto-optimal design choices change depending on the channel

Design and implementation of a downlink MC-CDMA receiver

Cette thèse présente une étude d'un système complet de transmission en liaison descendante utilisant la technologie multi-porteuse avec l'accès multiple par division de code (Multi-Carrier Code Division Multiple Access, MC-CDMA). L'étude inclut la synchronisation et l'estimation du canal pour un système MC-CDMA en liaison descendante ainsi que l'implémentation sur puce FPGA d'un récepteur MC-CDMA en liaison descendante en bande de base. Le MC-CDMA est une combinaison de la technique de multiplexage par fréquence orthogonale (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing, OFDM) et de l'accès multiple par répartition de code (CDMA), et ce dans le but d'intégrer les deux technologies. Le système MC-CDMA est conçu pour fonctionner à l'intérieur de la contrainte d'une bande de fréquence de 5 MHz pour les modèles de canaux intérieur/extérieur pédestre et véhiculaire tel que décrit par le "Third Genaration Partnership Project" (3GPP). La composante OFDM du système MC-CDMA a été simulée en utilisant le logiciel MATLAB dans le but d'obtenir des paramètres de base. Des codes orthogonaux à facteur d'étalement variable (OVSF) de longueur 8 ont été choisis comme codes d'étalement pour notre système MC-CDMA. Ceci permet de supporter des taux de transmission maximum jusquà 20.6 Mbps et 22.875 Mbps (données non codées, pleine charge de 8 utilisateurs) pour les canaux intérieur/extérieur pédestre et véhiculaire, respectivement. Une étude analytique des expressions de taux d'erreur binaire pour le MC-CDMA dans un canal multivoies de Rayleigh a été réalisée dans le but d'évaluer rapidement et de façon précise les performances. Des techniques d'estimation de canal basées sur les décisions antérieures ont été étudiées afin d'améliorer encore plus les performances de taux d'erreur binaire du système MC-CDMA en liaison descendante. L'estimateur de canal basé sur les décisions antérieures et utilisant le critère de l'erreur quadratique minimale linéaire avec une matrice' de corrélation du canal de taille 64 x 64 a été choisi comme étant un bon compromis entre la performance et la complexité pour une implementation sur puce FPGA. Une nouvelle séquence d'apprentissage a été conçue pour le récepteur dans la configuration intérieur/extérieur pédestre dans le but d'estimer de façon grossière le temps de synchronisation et le décalage fréquentiel fractionnaire de la porteuse dans le domaine du temps. Les estimations fines du temps de synchronisation et du décalage fréquentiel de la porteuse ont été effectués dans le domaine des fréquences à l'aide de sous-porteuses pilotes. Un récepteur en liaison descendante MC-CDMA complet pour le canal intérieur /extérieur pédestre avec les synchronisations en temps et en fréquence en boucle fermée a été simulé avant de procéder à l'implémentation matérielle. Le récepteur en liaison descendante en bande de base pour le canal intérieur/extérieur pédestre a été implémenté sur un système de développement fabriqué par la compagnie Nallatech et utilisant le circuit XtremeDSP de Xilinx. Un transmetteur compatible avec le système de réception a également été réalisé. Des tests fonctionnels du récepteur ont été effectués dans un environnement sans fil statique de laboratoire. Un environnement de test plus dynamique, incluant la mobilité du transmetteur, du récepteur ou des éléments dispersifs, aurait été souhaitable, mais n'a pu être réalisé étant donné les difficultés logistiques inhérentes. Les taux d'erreur binaire mesurés avec différents nombres d'usagers actifs et différentes modulations sont proches des simulations sur ordinateurs pour un canal avec bruit blanc gaussien additif

Channel estimation, data detection and carrier frequency offset estimation in OFDM systems

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) plays an important role in the implementation of high data rate communication. In this thesis, the problems of data detection and channel and carrier frequency offset estimation in OFDM systems are studied. Multi-symbol non-coherent data detection is studied which performs data detection by processing multiple symbols without the knowledge of the channel impulse response (CIR). For coherent data detection, the CIR needs to be estimated. Our objective in this thesis is to work on blind channel estimators which can extract the CIR using just one block of received OFDM data. A blind channel estimator for (Single Input Multi Output) SIMO OFDM systems is derived. The conditions under which the estimator is identifiable is studied and solutions to resolve the phase ambiguity of the proposed estimator are given.A channel estimator for superimposed OFDM systems is proposed and its CRB is derived. The idea of simultaneous transmission of pilot and data symbols on each subcarrier, the so called superimposed technique, introduces the efficient use of bandwidth in OFDM context. Pilot symbols can be added to data symbols to enable CIR estimation without sacrificing the data rate. Despite the many advantages of OFDM, it suffers from sensitivity to carrier frequency offset (CFO). CFO destroys the orthogonality between the subcarriers. Thus, it is necessary for the receiver to estimate and compensate for the frequency offset. Several high accuracy estimators are derived. These include CFO estimators, as well as a joint iterative channel/CFO estimator/data detector for superimposed OFDM. The objective is to achieve CFO estimation with using just one OFDM block of received data and without the knowledge of CIR

Spectrally Modulated Spectrally Encoded Framework Based Cognitive Radio in Mobile Environment

Radio spectrum has become a precious resource, and it has long been the dream of wireless communication engineers to maximize the utilization of the radio spectrum. Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) and Cognitive Radio (CR) have been considered promising to enhance the efficiency and utilization of the spectrum. Since some of the spectrum bands are occupied by primary users (PUs), the available spectrum for secondary users (SUs) are non-contiguous, and multi-carrier transmission technologies become the natural solution to occupy those non-contiguous bands. Non-contiguous multi-carrier based modulations, such as NC-OFDM (non-contiguous Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing), NC-MC-CDMA (non-contiguous multi-carrier code division multiple access) and NC-SC-OFDM (non-contiguous single carrier OFDM), allow the SUs to utilize the available spectrum. Spectrally Modulated Spectrally Encoded (SMSE) framework offers a general framework to generate multi-carrier based waveform for CR. However, it is well known that all multi-carrier transmission technologies suffer significant performance degradation resulting from inter-carrier interference (ICI) in high mobility environments. Current research work in cognitive radio has not sufficiently considered and addressed this issue yet. Hence, it is highly desired to study the effect of mobility on CR communication systems and how to improve the performance through affordable low-complexity signal processing techniques. In this dissertation, we analyze the inter-carrier interference for SMSE based multi-carrier transmissions in CR, and propose multiple ICI mitigation techniques and carrier frequency offset (CFO) estimator. Specifically, (1) an ICI self-cancellation algorithm is adapted to the MC-CDMA system by designing new spreading codes to enable the system with the capability to reduce the ICI; (2) a blind ICI cancellation technique named Total ICI Cancellation is proposed to perfectly remove the ICI effect for OFDM and MC-CDMA systems and provide the performance approximately identical to that of the systems without ICI; (3) a novel modulation scheme, called Magnitude Keyed Modulation (MKM), is proposed to combine with SC-OFDM system and provide ICI immunity feature so that the system performance is not affected by the mobility or carrier frequency offset; (4) a blind carrier frequency offset estimation algorithm is proposed to accurately estimate the CFO; (5) finally, compared to traditional ICI analysis and cancellation techniques with assumption of constant carrier frequency offset among all the subcarriers, subcarrier varying CFO scenario is considered for the wideband multi-carrier transmission and non-contiguous multi-carrier transmission for CR, and an ICI total cancellation algorithm is proposed for the multi-carrier system with subcarrier varying CFOs to entirely remove the ICI

Spectrally Modulated Spectrally Encoded Framework Based Cognitive Radio in Mobile Environment

Radio spectrum has become a precious resource, and it has long been the dream of wireless communication engineers to maximize the utilization of the radio spectrum. Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) and Cognitive Radio (CR) have been considered promising to enhance the efficiency and utilization of the spectrum. Since some of the spectrum bands are occupied by primary users (PUs), the available spectrum for secondary users (SUs) are non-contiguous, and multi-carrier transmission technologies become the natural solution to occupy those non-contiguous bands. Non-contiguous multi-carrier based modulations, such as NC-OFDM (non-contiguous Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing), NC-MC-CDMA (non-contiguous multi-carrier code division multiple access) and NC-SC-OFDM (non-contiguous single carrier OFDM), allow the SUs to utilize the available spectrum. Spectrally Modulated Spectrally Encoded (SMSE) framework offers a general framework to generate multi-carrier based waveform for CR. However, it is well known that all multi-carrier transmission technologies suffer significant performance degradation resulting from inter-carrier interference (ICI) in high mobility environments. Current research work in cognitive radio has not sufficiently considered and addressed this issue yet. Hence, it is highly desired to study the effect of mobility on CR communication systems and how to improve the performance through affordable low-complexity signal processing techniques. In this dissertation, we analyze the inter-carrier interference for SMSE based multi-carrier transmissions in CR, and propose multiple ICI mitigation techniques and carrier frequency offset (CFO) estimator. Specifically, (1) an ICI self-cancellation algorithm is adapted to the MC-CDMA system by designing new spreading codes to enable the system with the capability to reduce the ICI; (2) a blind ICI cancellation technique named Total ICI Cancellation is proposed to perfectly remove the ICI effect for OFDM and MC-CDMA systems and provide the performance approximately identical to that of the systems without ICI; (3) a novel modulation scheme, called Magnitude Keyed Modulation (MKM), is proposed to combine with SC-OFDM system and provide ICI immunity feature so that the system performance is not affected by the mobility or carrier frequency offset; (4) a blind carrier frequency offset estimation algorithm is proposed to accurately estimate the CFO; (5) finally, compared to traditional ICI analysis and cancellation techniques with assumption of constant carrier frequency offset among all the subcarriers, subcarrier varying CFO scenario is considered for the wideband multi-carrier transmission and non-contiguous multi-carrier transmission for CR, and an ICI total cancellation algorithm is proposed for the multi-carrier system with subcarrier varying CFOs to entirely remove the ICI