OFDM(A) Competence Development Part I

Per Hjalmar Lehne, Frode Bhagen, Telenor R&I

R&I seminar, 23 January 2008, Fornebu, Norway
Per-hjalmar.lehne@telenor.com
Frode.bohagen@telenor.com

Outline
Part I: What is OFDM?
Part II: Introducing multiple access: OFDMA, SC-FDMA
Part III: Wireless standards based on OFDMA
Part IV: Radio planning of OFDMA

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
2

OFDM Basic Concept

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is a
multi-carrier modulation scheme
First break the data into small portions
Then use a number of parallel orthogonal sub-carriers to transmit
the data

Conventional transmission uses a single carrier, which is

modulated with all the data to be sent

Single Carrier Company

Multi Carrier Company

OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
3

OFDM Basic Concept

OFDM is a special case of

Frequency Division
Multiplexing (FDM)

For FDM
No special relationship between
the carrier frequencies
Guard bands have to be inserted
to avoid Adjacent Channel
Interference (ACI)

For OFDM
Strict relation between carriers:
fk = kf where f = 1/TU
(TU - symbol period)
Carriers are orthogonal to each
other and can be packed tight

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
4

OFDM Transmission model

Channel, h(t)

Modulator
and transmitter

Wireless channel
Receiver and demodulator
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
5

Orthogonality the essential property

Example: Receiver branch k
Ideal channel: No noise and no multipath

1
TU

TU N c 1

a
0

q 0

j 2 qft

j 2 kft

dt

N c 1

aq

q 0

TU

TU

e
0

j2 q k

1
t
TU

ak , k q
dt
0, k q

Received signal,
r(t)

Tu = 1/f gives subcarrier orthogonality over one Tu

=> possible to separate subcarriers in receiver
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
6

OFDM Signal properties

Frequency domain

Time domain

Power Spectrum for OFDM symbol

frequency
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
7

OFDM Signal properties

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
8

Multipath channel

Diffracted and Scattered Paths

[ k , k ]

LOS Path

[ 0 , 0 ]

[1 , 1 ]
Reflected Path

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
9

Multipath channel (cyclic prefix)

Multipath introduces inter-symbol-interference (ISI)
TU

Prefix is added to avoid ISI

Example multipath profile

TCP

TU

Amplitude
[]

Time
[]

The prefix is made cyclic to avoid inter-carrier-interference

(ICI) (maintain orthogonality)

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
10

Multipath channel (cyclic prefix)

Tcp should cover the maximum length of the time
dispersion
Increasing Tcp implies increased overhead in power and
bandwidth (Tcp/ TS)
For large transmission distances there is a trade-off
between power loss and time dispersion
TS

CP

Useful symbol

CP
Tcp

Useful symbol

CP

Useful symbol

TU

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
11

Multipath channel (frequency diversity)

The OFDM symbol can be exposed to a frequency selective

channel

The attenuation for each subcarrier can be viewed as flat

Due to the cyclic prefix there is no need for a complex equalizer

Possible transmission techniques

Forward error correction (FEC) over the frequency band
Adaptive coding and modulation per carrier

=
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
12

Multipath channel (frequency diversity)

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
13

Multipath channel (pilot symbols)

The channel parameters can be estimated based on known

symbols (pilot symbols)

The pilot symbols should have sufficient density to provide

estimates with good quality (tradeoff with efficiency)

Different estimation methods exist

Averaging combined with interpolation
Minimum-mean square error (MMSE)

Time

Pilot symbol
Frequency

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
14

The Peak to Average Power Problem

A OFDM signal consists of a number of independently modulated

symbols

The sum of independently modulated subcarriers can have large

amplitude variations

x(t)

N c 1

a
k 0

e j2 kf t

Results in a large peak-to-average-power ratio (PAPR)

PA

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
15

The Peak to Average Power Problem

Example with 8 carriers and

BPSK modulation
x(t) plotted

It can be shown that the PAPR

becomes equal to Nc

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
16

The Peak to Average Power Problem

High efficiency power amplifiers

are desirable

AM/AM characteristic

For the handset, long battery life

For the base station, reduced
operating costs

A large PAPR is negative for the

power amplifier efficiency

Non-linearity results in intermodulation

Degrades BER performance

POUT

OBO

IBO

Out-of-band radiation
PA
Average

Peak

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
17

PIN

The Peak to Average Power Problem

Different tools to deal with large PAPR
Signal distortion techniques
Clipping and windowing introduces distortion and out-of-band
radiation, tradeoff with respect to reduced backoff
Coding techniques
FEC codes excludes OFDM symbols with a large PAPR (decreasing
the PAPR decreases code space). Tone reservation, and precoding are other examples of coding techniques.
Scrambling techniques
Different scrambling sequences are applied, and the one
resulting in the smallest PAPR is chosen

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
18

OFDM Synchronization
Timing recovery
No problem if offset is within
max

CP

Useful symbol
Integration period, TU

Frequency synchronization
A carrier synchronization error will introduce phase
rotation, amplitude reduction and ICI
Frequency offsets of up to 2 % of f is negligible
Even offsets of 5 10 % can be tolerated in many
situations
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
19

Choosing the OFDM parameters

Symbol time (TU) and subcarrier
spacing (f) are inverse
TU = 1/f

Consequences of increasing the

subcarrier spacing

Increase CP
overhead

Increasing
subcarrier spacing

Increase cyclic prefix overhead

Consequences of decreasing the

subcarrier spacing

TU

Decreasing
subcarrier spacing

Increase sensitivity to frequency

inaccuracy
Increasing number of subcarriers
increases Tx and Rx complexity

Increase sensitivity to
frequency accuracy
OFDM Competence Development
23 Jan 2008
20

Summary

Advantages
Splitting the channel into narrowband channels enables significant
simplification of equalizer design
Effective implementation possible by applying FFT
Flexible bandwidths enabled through scalable number of subchannels
Possible to exploit both time and frequency domain variations (time
domain adaptation/coding + freq. domain adaptation/coding)

Challenges
Large peak to average power ratio

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
21

Summary

PA

CP

Channel, h(t)

OFDM Competence Development

23 Jan 2008
22