Corso di Comunicazioni Mobili

Data Transmission By
OFDM Modulation

Prof. Carlo Regazzoni

1

References
[1]
M.L. Doelz, E.T. Heald, D. Martin, Binary Data
Transmission Techniques
for Linear Systems, Proceedings of IRE, Maggio 1957, pp. 656-661.
[2]
B. Hirosaki, An Orthogonally Multiplexed QAM System Using the Discrete
Fourier Transform, IEEE Trans on Comm, Vol. 29, No. 7, Luglio 1981, pp. 982-989.
[3]
J.A.C. Bingham, Multicarrier Modulation for Data Transmission: An Idea
Whose Time Has Come, IEEE Comm. Magazine, Maggio 1990, pp. 5- 14.
[4]
T. De Cousanon, R. Monnier, J.B. Rault, OFDM for digital TV broadcasting;
Signal Processing, Vol. 39
(1994), pp. 1-32.
[5]
B. Le Floch, M. Alard, C. Berrou, Coded Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiplex, Proceedings of IEEE, Vol. 83, No.6, Giugno 1995, pp. 982-996.
[6]
E. Ayanoglu, et al, VOFDM Broadband Wireless Transmission and Its
Advantages over Single Carrier Modulation, Proc of ICC 2001 Conference, Helsinki
(SF) 11-14 Giugno 2001, Vol. 6, pp. 16601664.

Introduction
The OFDM modulation (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) is the
basic technique among the multi-carrier modulations a clear example of multicarrier modulation is the DMT that is employed in the ADSL standard for
transmissions on twisted pair with high bit-rate.
Another example is comprised by the MC-CDMA techniques (Multi-carrier
CDMA) which are the spread-spectrum version of the OFDM modulation.
The basic concept of multi-carrier modulation is the transmission in diversity,
i.e. the transmission of information on sub-channels with different bandwidth,
where the distortion effects of the channel are different.
As contrary to the single-carrier techniques, transmitted message will suffer, in
a different measure, of the frequency selective effects of the channel. But a
substantial improvement of performances in terms of BER is possible.

Historical Mentions
Multi-carrier modulation techniques are considered the fourth generation (4G)
communication systems used for fixed and mobile digital transmission.
The idea of multi-carrier modulation dates at the
end of fifties (Doelz, Heald, Martin, Procedings of
IRE, May 1957, pp. 656-661).
This work showed a practical implementation of a
digital transmission system (called KINEPLEX) with
bit multiplexing on orthogonal carriers, which is the
basis principles of the OFDM.

KINEPLEX
demodulator

KINEPLEX S/P converter

Historical Mentions
The main problem of KINEPLEX lies in the totally analogical implementation of
multiplexer (RLC resonance oscillators) which involves the huge dimension of
the equipments.
The theoretical evolution, which allowed the practical implementation of an
OFDM system, was studied by B. Hirosaki in 1981 (IEEE Trans on Comm, July
1981, pp. 982-989), i.e. the multiplexing mapping in frequency on a structure
like Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).
An FFT structure can be implemented in a totally digital and software way.
Ten years after the evolution of digital processing technology (such as DSP)
allowed the practical implementation of an OFDM system (see J.C. Bingham,
IEEE Comm. Magazine, May 1990, pp. 5-14).
The first commercial prototypes of OFDM systems were announced in 2001
(Ciscos VOFDM presented in the conference ICC2001) and their
commercialization is expected for 2005
5

OFDM Modulation:
Introduction
The OFDM is a multi-carrier modulation in which carriers are frequency
spaced by a multiple of 1/T, where T is the modulation period, and it is
characterized by an overlap of the spectrum of the signals transmitted on
different carriers.
A possible OFDM modulator could be the following:

OFDM Modulation:
Introduction
The previous figure shows a symbol stream, codified in-phase and inquadrature components (an , bn) is cyclically multiplexed on N branches
containing a QAM digital modulator.
The output of the k-th modulation branch is an M-QAM signal, modulated on
carrier frequency fk which is orthogonal to each other.
In this way it is possible, at the receiver, to recover the symbol streams
transmitted in every branch and to rebuild, after a de-multiplexing operation, the
original symbol stream.

OFDM Modulation: Transmitted

Signal
Every QAM modulator has an assigned constellation that can be equal in every
branch.
Given r jk and jk , polar coordinates of the transmitted symbol in the QAM
constellation relative to the k-th carrier in the interval [(j - 1)T, jT ], the
transmitted signal can be written as:
N 1

sk (t )

f k f0

k
T
Fundamental frequency

s (t )
k

k 0

Signal transmitted by the k-th carrier

where

s (t )

rjk cos(2f k (t jT ) jk ) (t jT )

Signal transmitted on the channel

1, 0 t T
(t )
0, altrimenti
Rectangular Pulse

N : number of sinusoidal carriers

8

OFDM Modulation: Transmitted

Signal
The signal transmitted on the channel is a summation of a huge number of
sinusoidal carriers, modulated with arbitrary phase and amplitude.
The result, in the time domain, is a noise-like signal:

OFDM Modulation: Transmitted

Signal
The duration T of an OFDM modulation impulse is fixed and its equal to:

Na
T
NTs
D

where
D is the source bit-rate;
a is the number of bit for each transmitted symbol;
Ts is the duration time of a symbol ( N multiplexed
symbols are transmitted in the duration time of an
OFDM modulation pulse);
10

OFDM Modulation: Transmitted

Signal
The spectrum of the signal transmitted by every carrier
assumes
Sk ( f )
the shape of the function sin( f ) f and zero crossing every 1/T Hz.
The spectrum of the overall transmitted signal
S( f )
functions sin ( f ) f spaced by 1/T Hz.

is a succession of

The spectral components given by the single carriers are overlapped, as shown
in figure:

11

OFDM Modulation: Bandwidth

Occupation
The spectrum of the OFDM signal has theoretically unlimited bandwidth.
But it needs a truncation to compute the significant bandwidth occupied by the
signal.
The truncation is performed to remove all the components of the power
spectrum which are at least 20 dB under the amplitude of main lobe.
In this case only two side lobes are conserved, as shown in the following
figure:

12

OFDM Modulation: Bandwidth

Occupation
The bandwidth occupied by the N carriers of the OFMD signal is equal to:

N 1
3 N 5
2
T
T
T

It can be interesting to compute the spectral efficiency of the QAM

modulation, given by the ratio (source bit-rate)/(occupied bandwidth).
Supposing to have an M-QAM constellation (or M-PSK) in two dimensions with
2a points (where a is the number of bits for every transmitted symbol); since
in T are transmitted N symbols, source bit-rate can be expressed as:

Na
Bit/sec.
T

( N 5) D
Hz.
Na

Now its easy to compute the spectral efficiency

of the QAM modulation, that is given by:

D
N

a
W N 5
13

OFDM Modulation: Bandwidth

Occupation
In the following figure the
power spectral density of
an
OFDM
modulated
signal with T = 125 nsec, f0
= 8 MHz, number of carriers
N = 32, 128, 512 is shown.
Signal spectrum is inclined
to become ideal (without
using
spectral
shaping
filters, like Nyquist filter with
low roll-off) when N is high.
In this case the spectral efficiency can be written as:

lim N a

The figure points out that ; a (ideal value, difficult to reach with a QAM
modulation, even using Nyquist filters) for high values (but finite) of N.
14

OFDM Demodulation
In the following figure a possible
modulator/demodulator
schematic

is

shown.

The

demodulator is based on the

orthogonality of the carriers. It
is composed by a bench of
demodulators with matched
filter used both for in-phase and
in-quadrature components.
Modulator

Demodulator
15

OFDM Demodulation
These orthogonality conditions on the carriers, both for in-phase and inquadrature components, allow to demodulate the signal, as pointed out in the
following formulas:
T

To have a correct demodulation

process, other two conditions,
which are considered guaranteed for
simplicity, are necessary:
strict synchronization on the
carrier
(coherent
demodulation);
strict synchronization of the
clock on the receiver side
(clock recovery)

r cos ( 2f t
k

) cos ( 2f h t)dt 0

kh

T
T
rk cos ( k ) ak
2
2

k h

r cos ( 2f t
k

)sin( 2f h t)dt 0

kh

T
T
rk sin( k ) bk
2
2

k h

16

OFDM Modulation
A modulation/demodulation schematic, such as the previous one, cannot be
implemented via hardware with analog oscillators: it would be too much
expensive and the imperfections of the oscillators (frequency drift, phase noise)
would cause critical malfunctions.
But it can easily implemented via software, in a totally digital way, using the
FFT (Fast Fourier Transform).
In fact, if the k-th symbol (k = 1,,N , where N is the number of transmitted
symbols in a modulation period), mapped in the chosen M-QAM constellation,
is written as:

S k rk e j k ak jbk

S0 ,....., S N 1
Set of symbols
transmitted in T sec.

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OFDM Modulation
The OFDM signal transmitted on the channel can be obtained by the following
steps:
1. computing the Inverse FFT (IFFT) on a set of symbols transmitted in a
modulation period T
2.

performing the digital-to-analog conversion

(D/A) of the signal

obtained in the previous step.

In fact a sequence s(n) is generated by using an IFFT operation performed
on the set of symbols transmitted in the modulation period T, with a number of
samples NFFT (generally it is a power of 2).

18

OFDM Modulation
The operation, previous described, is the following:

s ( n)

1
N FFT
1
N FFT

N 1

1
N FFT
N 1

kn
S k WNNFFT

k 0

S k e

N 1

k 0

k 0

2
kn
N FFT

1
N FFT

1
N FFT

N 1

N 1

kn
S * k WNNFFT

k 0

S * k e

2
( N FFT k ) n
N FFT

k 0

2
kn k
N FFT

rk cos

n 0,.., N FFT 1

This result is obtained remembering one of the fundamental properties of the

W coefficients of the FFT, i.e. :

W k ( N n ) W kn

Since the set of N symbols has to be transmitted every T seconds, the

sampling frequency has to be:
1 1
fs
T N FFT

19

OFDM Modulation
Then, the s(n) sequence is sent to a D/A converter which works with a smaplig
frequency equal to
fs .
The s(t) signal, which is the output of the converter, can be written as:

s (t )

1
N FFT

N 1

rk cos
kf s t k
N FFT

k 0

t 0,....,

N FFT
fs

but it can also rewritten as:

s (t )

N FFT

N 1

rk cos 2f k t k

t 0,...., T f k

k 0

k
T

N FFT
fs

This is the base band OFDM signal!

20

OFDM Modulation
The following figure shows the complete schematic of and OFDM
modulator/demodulator system which uses the FFT

modulator

demodulator

k0=0 for simplicity

21

OFDM Modulation
This schematic can be implemented in a totally software way on a DSP
architecture because an FFT (or IFFT) structure can be mapped on this signal
processing architecture with well known algorithms.
With the actual technology a full-digital implementation is impossible; only the
base band stage and intermediate frequency stage are developed. The radio
frequency stage is still implemented with analogical components.

22

OFDM: performances on AWGN

channel
The performances of the OFDM modulation/demodulation systems on a noisy
channel depend on the chosen M-QAM constellation.
Supposing to transmit data on an AWGN channel, the signal received by the
matched filter associated to the k-th carrier, is the following:

ak' ak nki
bk' bk nkq

(in-phase component)
(in-quadrature component)

An error occurs when the noise components are greater than the half of the
distance d between two points of the constellation. Then the error probability
on the symbol in an OFDM system has the following expression:

d 1
P err p n erfc

2 2

i
k

d 2
8 k2

d depends on the chosen constellation and can be expressed as a function of

the average energy Ec of the constellation.
23

OFDM: performances on AWGN

channel
Practically the error probability of an OFDM system is the same of an M-QAM
system on a single carrier.

16 points QAM Constellation

8Ec2
d
10

32 points QAM Constellation

8Ec2
d
20

64 points QAM Constellation

8Ec2
d
42

128 points QAM Constellation

8Ec2
d
82

where

1
Ec
2

ak2 bk2
2c
k 0

2 c 1

c Number of points in the

constellation

24

OFDM: performances with pulse

noise
The OFDM modulation offers remarkable robustness properties against
impulsive noises, where impulsive noise is defined as a rectangular pulse
with limited amplitude and duration (generally inferior than the symbol time).
Hence it is a wide band disturb.
Since the information is coded in the frequency domain, the energy of the noise
pulse is distributed on the entire bandwidth of the spectrum. This fact reduce
its effect on the signal sub-carriers.

The following figure shows the error

probability versus the impulsive signalto-noise ratio.

25

OFDM: performances with jamming

noise
OFDM is much vulnerable respect to the narrow band interferences like
jamming ones, composed by sinusoidal tones which interfere with the signal
(man-made noise, ingress-noise); it offers worse performances than a normal
QAM (see the following figure with N=512 carriers).
The power of the OFDM signal is
concentrated in a reduced portion of
the spectrum; a noisy pulse which hits
in the bandwidth of the signal is able to
alter the bits transmitted by various subcarriers.

26

OFDM: performances with jamming

noise
A possible solution consist in switching off the sub-carriers corrupted by the
jamming pulse. This solution succeed if the position of the interfering tone in
the frequency domain is fixed and known. It can be implemented without any
additional hardware, by using the IFFT properties.
If the position of the interfering tone is not fixed known, a FEC coding has to
be introduced before the modulator (called Coded-OFDM or COFDM)

27

OFDM: behave on multipath channel

After a multipath channel, a series of delayed and out of phase replica of the
desired signal are received.
Hence, sampling the signal on a certain instant, a linear combination of the
previous symbol of the current symbol, and of the following symbol is
obtained (ISI); then the channel behaves like a linear filter.
Theoretically, it could be possible to use the inverse equalizers, which are
digital filters whose the coefficients are dynamically updated by proper
algorithms.
The coefficients updating is a computationally heavy operation and
substantially inefficient if the delay spread of the channel is greater than the
modulation period (this condition is equivalent to the frequency selectivity
for the multipath fading)
The OFDM techniques allow to increase the modulation period and to
generate a modulated signal for which the channel is not frequency selective;
but the bit-rate remain the same.
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OFDM: behave on multipath

channel
Supposing to introduce a multipath channel with discreet paths, it can be
represented by the following impulse response:
P

h(t )

A t
p

p 0

Without losing generality, an extremely simplified model of the multipath

channel can be assumed:

h(t ) t t

The signal received by every single carrier can be written as a summation of

the LoS signal and its delayed echo.

s ' (t ) s t s t
It is impossible to insulate (see
figure) an interval of T seconds
which contains only one symbol:
ISI appears.

29

OFDM: behave on multipath

channel
A possible solution to remove this kind of interference consists in increasing the
duration of the OFDM symbol to (T+) where is called cyclic prefix.
Sampling properly the
received signal between
the instants T1 and T2 ,
its possible to extract a
portion of the signal, with
duration
T
seconds,
which
contains
information only about the
j-th symbol, which is the
desired; ISI is removed.
To realize this mechanism, keeping the
orthogonality, an expansion of the
duration of the modulated carriers on the
left (as shown in the figure) of seconds
is needed.

30

OFDM: behave on multipath

channel
To use the OFDM on a channel where the delay spread is equal to p , this
process has to be applied to every single sub-carrier with a cyclic prefix of p.
The ISI-free demodulation is possible if the received signal is processed in an
interval comprised between p and (T+ p), where T is the modulation period.
The cyclic prefix can be' inserted by modulating quickly the N carriers during a
T T p
modulation period:
before inserting, afterwards, the cyclic
prefix.
k
k
To keep orthogonality, N carriers spaced by

f k'

'

k 0,.., N 1

should be used, before inserting, afterwards, the cyclic prefix.

The transmitted signal will be the following:

s (t )

N 1

rjk cos(2f k't jk 2f k' p ) (t jT )

j k 0

The demodulation will be performed during the period T.

31

OFDM: behave on multipath

channel
The use of the cyclic prefix can limit the spectral efficiency of the modulation. It
can be shown that the spectral efficiency of an OFDM system with cyclic prefix
p is equal to:

N T p
D
'
a
N 5T 6 p
W

Where T is fixed and its equal to:

Na
D

The following figure shows the

required bandwidth as a function
of the number of the orthogonal
carriers,
with
D=34Mb/s,
a=3,4,5,6 e p = 8msec.
32