A Novel Method Based DCT to Reduce PAPR of OFDM Systems
Sun Shanlin, Hou Chunping, Yan Lei, Fu Jinlin
Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.；Guilin College of Aerospace technology, Guilin, China
Email: shy1997@126.com
Abstract—orthogonal frequency division multiplexing
(OFDM) systems based on discrete cosine transform
(DCT) is proposed for the first time in this paper in order
to solve the distortion due to great Peak-to-Average
Power Ratio (PAPR) of OFDM systems signals. The
character of the DCT energy focused is made use of in the
frequency domain, and it helps to reduce the PAPR
engendered by IFFT at the transmitter statistically,
avoiding the nonlinear distortion in OFDM systems due to
great change of PAPR. In this paper, the characters of
DCT algorithm are analyzed first, and then the algorithm
is applied to signal processing in OFDM systems. It is
mathematically verified that this method is potent to
reduce the PAPR. Lastly, the simulation results show that
the proposed scheme in reducing the threshold of PAPR
statistically is feasible.
Index Terms—Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT),
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM),
Peak-to-Average Power Ratio (PAPR)
I. INTRODUCTION
I N the wireless mobile channel environment, fading
and inter symbols interference (ISI) of the receiver
signal appear because of multi-path effects,
time-varying fast fading and Doppler frequency shift. It
causes the error of receiver and degrades the
communication performance. OFDM systems are
stronger than single-carrier systems at multi-path fading
channel environment, so they are used in many high
data rate transmission systems such as digital video
broadcasting (DVB), IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.16, and
HIPERLAN Type II, etc.
One of the implementation drawbacks of OFDM
is that the transmitted signal has a high PAPR, a large
dynamic signal range with a very high PAPR. As a
result, the OFDM signal will be clipped when passed
through a nonlinear power amplifier at the transmitter
end. Clipping degrades the bit-error-rate (BER)
performance and causes spectral spreading [1，2]. One
way to solve this problem is to force the amplifier to
work in its linear region. Unfortunately, such a solution
is not powerful efficient. Power efficiency is necessary
in wireless communication as it provides adequate area
coverage, saves power consumption, and allows
small-size terminals. It is, therefore, important to aim at
a power efficient operation of the power amplifier with
Sponsors: the 973 program of China (No. 2007CB310605) and the National Natural Science Fund of China (No. 60772011)
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low back-off values and try to prevent the occurrence of
signal clipping. This can be done through some
manipulations of the OFDM signal before transmission.
Therefore, the subject of finding a computationally
efficient algorithm to decrease the PAPR in OFDM
systems has become an active research topic [1].
To achieve the above objective, several proposals
have been suggested and studied in the literature. For
instance, we find clipping with filtering, block coding,
optimization with tone reservation (TR), and selected
mapping [3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. However, most of these
methods try to exploit the sub-carrier symbols of the
OFDM block by creating some correlation between
them. As a result, the reduction in PAPR achieved by
these techniques is relative and is obtained at the
expense of either additional complexity to the OFDM
transceiver, a high coding overhead, and/or the need of
some kind of transmitter/receiver symbol handshake.
In this paper, we consider DCT as a way of reducing
the PAPR of OFDM transmitted signals. It makes use of
the character of the DCT energy focused in the
frequency domain. The data of OFDM signal is
modulated by IFFT after being dealt with DCT, which
can reduce the PAPR of OFDM systems. Compared
with the means of SLM-OFDM and PTS-OFDM,
DCT-OFDM maintains the system orthogonal
properties, which will not result in additional noise and
need not transmit side information. At the same time,
the proposed method reduces the PAPR greatly and the
system has character of low complexity hardware.
DCT-OFDM is an ideal scheme to reduce PAPR of
OFDM.
II. ACHIEVEMENT OF DCT
Sequence data f (x ) of OFDM is transformed with
DCT and we will get sequence data F (u ) , which changes
the values of the elements of sequence data. However,
the sequence structure will not be changed. At the same
time, many zero elements will appear in the
transformed sequence. That means, the energy of the
signal focuses on some sub-carriers, and PAPR is
mostly affected by them. For example, N =8,
and f (x ) =[1，1，1 ，1， -1， -1， -1， -1]. We will
get:
1
 F (u ) = DCTf ( x) B. THE IMPROVEMENT OF PAPR OF
DCT-OFDM
= [0,2.563,0,−0.9,0,0.601,0,−0.51] (1) One of the implementation drawbacks of OFDM is
In equation (1), the largest element of the sequence that the transmitted signal has a high PAPR. The largest
after being transformed is 2.563, and the other elements instantaneous peak power will appear if all sub-carrier
are very small or even 0, which indicates that the energy phases are accumulated to the same direction in the
of OFDM sequence is focused by DCT. In addition, the same time. When the number of OFDM sub-carriers is
energy keeps the same after DCT, so the total energy N and Xi（i＝0，1，2…，N-1）is the data of N
remains unchanged. Just as equation (1) figures: sub-signals, the most amplitude of out Sk (k=0,1,…N-1)
2.563 2 + (− 0.9 ) + 0.6012 + (− 0.51) ≈ 8
2 2
can be expressed:
⎧ 1 N −1 ⎛ 2πik ⎞⎫
S k max = max ⎨ ∑ X i exp⎜ j
⎝ N ⎠⎭
⎟⎬
⎩ N i =0
1 N −1
∑ Xi
N i =0
=
(2)
The peak amplitude of OFDM symbols corresponds
to the maximum instantaneous power.
2
1 ⎛ N −1 ⎞
= ⎜∑ Xi ⎟
2
Ppro max = S k pro max
N ⎝ i =0 ⎠
(3)
In the time domain, for N positive numbers x0,
x1,…,xN-1, we will get inequality (4)
2
⎛ x0 + x1 + ...+ xN −1 ⎞ 1 2 2
⎜
N
( 2
⎟ ≤ x0 + x1 + ...+ xN −1 )
Fig.1 The Spectrum of 256 DCT-OFDM ⎝ ⎠ N (4)
Fig.1 indicates that DCT can focus the signal energy From (4) we can get
on some little sub-carriers, which can depress PAPR. N −1 N −1

Ⅲ. THE PREFERENCE OF DCT-OFDM SYSTEM ∑x i ≤ N⋅ ∑x i

2

A. DCT-OFDM
i =0 i =0 (5)
From (4) and (5), we can get:
1 ⎛ N −1 2⎞
N −1
⎜∑ Xi ⎟ ≤ ∑ Xi = P
2
Ppro max =
N ⎝ i =0 ⎠ i =0 (6)
Where P is the total power, that is to say, OFDM
peak power may be equivalent to the total signal power.
2

Each sub-carrier power is 1 after normalized, so X i = 1 .

The total power of OFDM signal is N and the peak
amplitude of signal is:
1 N −1 1
S k pro max = ∑
N i =0
Xi =
N
⋅N = N
(7)
Fig.2 the frame of DCT-OFDM Making use of character of DCT, we transform real
Fig.2 is the base band system of OFDM based on and imaginary parts of Xi by DCT in frequency domain.
DCT. DCT is imported before the IFFT of conventional X = {X 0 , X 1 ,…, X N −1 }
Assuming that is the vector data
OFDM system. In frequency domain, the OFDM signal
in frequency domain, where X i = X i Re + jX i Im ，
is transformed with DCT. The character of the DCT
energy focus redistributes power on every sub-carrier and X i Re , X i Im are the vectors of real and imaginary parts
which can reduce the PAPR. It will not influence the respectively. We can get vector A={A0，A1，A2，…，
orthogonal character of OFDM because the DCT goes AN-1} after DCT.
before IFFT. The original signal can be resumed if A = DCT( X ) = CXRe + jCXIm = ARe + jAIm (8)
IDCT is inserted after FFT. DCT-OFDM system block
Where C is DCT matrix, ARe, AIm are the vectors of
is shown in Fig.2 [11].
real and imaginary parts of A respectively. In other

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 words, DCT of A equals to DCT of the real and ⎛ ⎛π π ⎞ ⎞
imaginary parts of A. According to the characteristic of ⎜ tg⎜ − ⎟ ⎟
1 ⎜ 2N ⎝ 4 8 N ⎠ π
unitary transformation, the total power of real and SDCT ≤ 2 −1 + ln + csc ⎟
imaginary parts keeps unchanged after DCT. The total N⎜ π ⎛π ⎞ 4N ⎟
⎜ tg⎜ ⎟ ⎟
signal power is the sum of real and imaginary power. ⎝ ⎝ 8N ⎠ ⎠ (12)
Thus, the total power of signal keeps constant after 2
DCT lim S DCT ≤ 2.2825 + ln N
N →∞ π (13)
Assuming that PX is the total power of signal and PA
is the total power of signal after DCT.
PA = PX = PA Re + PA Im = PX Re + PX Im Ⅳ SIMULATION
N −1 N −1 A. DCT-OFDM SIMULATION PERFORMANCE
= ∑ An = ∑ X i
2 2
According to (7) and (13) ，we compared OFDM
n =0 i =0 (9) maximum normalized amplitude with that of
Where SDCT is the most of peak power of OFDM after DCT-OFDM, the results are shown in table.1. The
DCT. results of our analysis are the same as that in theory.
⎧ N−1 ⎧ ⎡πu(2i +1)⎤⎫ N ⎫
j 2πul
1 N −1 Table.1 shows that the biggest amplitude can reduce
SDCT = ∑
N u=0
⎨ u ∑⎨ i ⎢
d X cos
⎣ 2N ⎥⎦⎭
⎬e ⎬ obviously with the increase of the number of
⎩ i=0 ⎩ ⎭ sub-carrier.
⎡ πu (2i + 1) ⎤
N −1 N −1 j 2πul
1
=
N
∑ X i ∑ du e
i =0 u =0
N
cos ⎢
⎣ 2 N ⎥⎦ Table.1 amplitude comparison between conventional
OFDM and DCT-OFDM symbol with different N
1 N −1 ⎡ jπu ( 42lN+ 2i +1)
N −1 jπu ( 4 l − 2 i −1)
⎤
=
2 N
∑ X i ∑ d u ⎢e + e 2N ⎥
i =0 u =0 ⎣ ⎦
N −1⎛ jπu ( 4l +2i +1) jπu ( 4l −2i−1)
1 N−1 2⎡ ⎞⎤
= ∑
2 N i=0
X i ⎢
N ⎢⎣
2 + ∑ ⎜
⎜ e 2N
+ e 2N ⎟⎥
⎟
u=1 ⎝ ⎠⎦⎥
⎡ i ⎤ Table.2 PAPR comparison between OFDM and
1− j(−1) 1+ j(−1) ⎥
i
1 N−1 2⎢
= ∑ i N⎢
2 N i=0
X 2 − 2 + jπ ( 4l +2i+1)
+ jπ ( 4l −2i−1)
⎥
DCT-OFDM with QPSK when N＝4
⎣ 1− e 2N 1− e 2N ⎦
( ) [ ]
N −1
1 1 1
=
2 N
∑X
i =0
i
2N
2 2 −4 +
2N
1 − j (− 1)
i

π (4l + 2i + 1) ⎤
⎡
⋅ ⎢1 + jctg (
4N
)⎥ +
1
1 + j (−1)i [ ]
⎣ ⎦ 2N
⎡ ⎛ π (4l − 2i − 1) ⎞⎤
⋅ ⎢1 + jctg ⎜ ⎟⎥
⎣ ⎝ 4N ⎠⎦ (10)
We can get：
N −1 N −1
1 1
S DCT ≤
2 N
∑XY
i =0
i i ≤
2 N
∑( X
i =0
i + Yi )
1 N −1
π (4l + 2i + 1) The PAPR of OFDM is compared with that of
≤
2 2N
∑
i =0
([4 − 2 2 + 2 ( csc
4N DCT-OFDM in table.2 where N=4 and QPSK is
introduced. The biggest PAPR is reduced from
π (4l − 2i − 1) 6.0206dB to 2.8145dB as shown in table.2. Therefore,
+ csc )]) DCT can improve the performance of OFDM. After
4N (11) DCT, many data values are very small and even some
Using triangle formula in equation (11), we can get: zero elements appear in the transformed sequence. In
time domain, there are a few big amplitude frequency
signals with many small signals added to. The peak
value of OFDM signal is decided by these signals.

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 Small signals can be considered as the interference to
big signals and have little impact on the instantaneous
peak of the signal.
Fig.3 the Improvement of PAPR0 of OFDM Based
DCT
In Fig.3, the PAPR of DCT-OFDM systems can be
reduced 3.5dB compared with OFDM systems. With
the increase of M, PAPR can be further reduced.
In Fig.4, Complementary Cumulative Distribution
Function (CCDF) Simulation Curve is shown for four
times over-sampling OFDM with N=128 and QPSK is
introduced. Four times over-sampling simulation curve
is close to the theoretical value curve [11]. The PAPR
performance of DCT-OFDM system is greatly
improved because of introducing of DCT and the
improvement is about 3.5dB when BER is 10-4.
Fig.4 the performance improvement of PAPR based
DCT
B. THE PERFORMANCE COMPARISON WITH
OTHER TECHNOLOGIES IN REDUCING PAPR
There are many methods to solve the problem of
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OFDM PAPR. We will compare PAPR performance of
SLM-OFDM, PTS-OFDM and DCT-OFDM [8，9，
10，12，13，14]. The simulation parameters in Fig.5
are as follows: N=128， QPSK modulation，four times
over-sampling. The random phases sequence vector
Pi(u) of SLM-OFDM is selected as Pi(u) ∈ {1,−1, j,− j} and
the weight coefficients of PTS-OFDM are selected as
bv ∈ {1,−1} and adjacent segmentation is introduced [10，
13].
In Fig.5, the performance of DCT-OFDM is between
SLM-OFDM with M=8 and SLM-OFDM with M=16.
When BER is 10-3, the threshold of DCT-OFDM is
0.15dB higher than SLM-OFDM system with M=16
and 0.4dB lower with M=8. Compared with
PTS-OFDM, the performance of DCT-OFDM is
between that of block number V is 4 and 8 in
PTS-OFDM. When BER is 10-3, the threshold of
DCT-OFDM is 0.3dB higher than that of V is 8 and 1dB
lower than that of V is 4. The SLM-OFDM transmitter
needs 8-IFFT circuits, 8 multipliers and an optimal
selection output circuit. Beside, log 2 ( M − 1)
redundancy side information is provided. Moreover,
DCT-OFDM only needs 2 additional DCT circuits. The
PTS-OFDM receiver, when V is 8, needs 8 FFT circuits,
adder circuit necessary and comparative choice circuit.
At the same time, 8bit weight information is needed. In
addition, SLM-OFDM and PTS-OFDM have a
shortcoming which the hardware complexity increases
in exponential order with the PAPR performance
improvement. DCT circuit is easy to realize because of
DCT technology used in digital video and the
realization of high-speed circuit structure of DCT.
Fig.5 the PAPR performance of three OFDM systems
Ⅴ. CONCLUSION
The proposed method to reduce OFDM PAPR based
on DCT is a better scheme which has not been studied
yet. The character of energy focus of DCT is used. The
OFDM symbols are transformed with DCT firstly, and
4
 then, are modulated with IFFT. As a result, PAPR of Global Telecommunications Conference.
OFDM is reduced. Compared with SLM-OFDM and 1997.GLOBECOM'97, IEEE,1997,1:3-8.
PTS-OFDM, DCT-OFDM has the advantage of low [14] Heung-Gyoon Ryu, Kyoung-Jas Youn. A new
hardware complexity and no side information. PAPR reduction scheme: SPW(subblock phase
weighting). IEEE Transactions on Consumer
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