Prolog to adaptive multicarrier modulation: a convenient framework for time-frequency processing in wireless communications

TLDR

OFDM’s evolution, benefits, drawbacks, and performance over highly dispersive channels, including time‑ and frequency‑domain synchronization errors and proposed solutions, are reviewed. The review aims to illuminate recent developments in adaptive bit allocation and turbo coding for OFDM. A comprehensive throughput comparison of the discussed schemes under a fixed target bit‑error rate of 10⁻⁴ is presented.

Abstract

A historical perspective of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) is given with reference to its literature. Its advantages and disadvantages are reviewed, and its performance is characterized over highly dispersive channels. The effects of both time- and frequency-domain synchronization errors are quantified, and a range of solutions proposed in the recent literature are reviewed. One of the main objectives of this review is to highlight the recent thinking behind adaptive bit allocation and turbo coding in the context of OFDM. This paper concludes with a wide-ranging throughput comparison of the schemes discussed herein under the unified constraint of a fixed target bit error rate of 10/sup -4/.