SPECTRAL CORRELATION ANALYSIS OF OFDM SIGNALS

Huang Qi-shan1**, Peng Qi-cong1, Lu You-rong1

1. School of Communication and Informatioin Engineering,
University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China.
** E-mail:susan30@uestc.edu.cn；susan_30@163.com

Abstract: Cyclostationarity is an important characteristic of signals. The orthogonal frequency-division

multiplexing （ OFDM ） signal is cyclostationary. Explicit formulas for the spectral
correlation density (SCD) for OFDM signal are derived. To illustrate the spectral correlation
characteristics of OFDM signal, the magnitudes of the spectral correlation functions are
graphed in graphical terms as the heights of surfaces above a bi-frequency plane. The
accurate analytic expression of the SCD function is very helpful for blind signal processing.
Kewords: spectral correlation density; OFDM; cyclostationarity

1. INTRODUCTION
In order to provide a variety of high-quality multi-media services to mobile users, future
4G systems must be able to support high capacity, variable bit rate information transmission and
high bandwidth efficiency. However, signals are usually impaired by severe fading due to the
frequency selectivity of the channel in broadband mobile radio environment. As an efficient
scheme to mitigate the effect of multi-path channel, OFDM has been considered as one of the
promising modulation candidates for 4G broadband mobile communication systems.
Cyclostationarity of signal is very useful in solving the problems of parameter estimation,
detection, modulation recognition, source location, and extraction of highly corrupted signals.
There are several methods to introduce cyclostationarity on OFDM signals, such as time-
frequency guard regions, pulse shaping, different transmit powers on the subcarriers [1]. The
spectral correlation density (SCD) function of OFDM signals contains much useful information
which can be used in blind signal processing application, for example, blind parameter
estimation.
The spectral correlation analysis of OFDM signals in this paper is the theoretical basis for
further signal processing. The SCD of passband OFDM signal has not been found in previous
work [1, 2]. With the analytic deviation and computer simulation in this paper, it is found that
the SCD of an OFDM subcarrier is affected by the symbol shaping window, symbol rate and
time delay. Furthermore, the SCD of OFDM signals is more accurately represented by summing
the cyclic spectral of all individual subcarriers for any symbol period. This derivation approach
could be applied to signal processing application such as blind parameter estimation, channel
identification, extraction etc.

2. CYCLIC SPECTRAL MODELING OF OFDM SIGNAL

Since IEEE 802.11a is a mature standard among OFDM applications, the transmitter block
diagram in 802.11a is adopted as the block diagram of OFDM signal generation in this paper,
shown in Fig.1. But the analysis in this paper does not confine to 802.11a standard.
 Symbol
FEC Interleaving GI IQ
IFFT Wave
Coder +Mapping Addition MOD.
shapping

HPA

Fig.1 Block diagram of OFDM signal generation [3]

An OFDM symbol cn ( t) , is constructed as an inverse Fourier transform (IFFT) of a set of

coefficients ck ,n , which can be defined as transmitted data, pilots, or training symbols. The

mathematical model of an OFDM symbol can be described as

N ST / 2
cn (t ) = q(t ) ∑ ck ,n e j 2 πk ∆f (t −TGI ) (1)
k =− N ST / 2

Where N ST is the total number of subcarriers, ∆f is the subcarrier frequency spacing, q (t )

is wave shaping pulse, TGI is a guard interval time to create the ‘circular prefix’. Because

circular prefix can be removed by correlator at the receiver side [4], let TGI = 0 in the analyses for

simplicity. The passband OFDM signal with time delay to and initial phase φo can be written as
∞ N ST / 2
s ( t ) = Re{∑ q ( t −nT
s o −t ) ∑k , n cj 2π ke∆ f ( t − nT s o−t ) j ( 2π fc t+ φo )
e }
n= − ∞ k = − NST / 2
∞ N ST / 2
(2)
= Re{ ∑ ∑ ck , n ej 2π k∆ f ( t − nTs o−t )
q t ( snT o −tj ( 2πe)fc +t −φo ) }
n = − ∞k = − NST / 2

= Re{r (t )ej ( 2π fc t+ φo )
}

∞ N ST / 2

where Re{.} denotes the real part of {.}, and r ( t ) = ∑ ∑ ck ,n e j 2π k ∆f (t −nTs −to ) q (t − nTs − to )
n = −∞ k = − N ST / 2

is the baseband envelope of the actual transmitted signal, fc denotes the carrier frequency, ck , n is

the modulated transmitted data in the nth OFDM symbol and the kth subcarrier. The OFDM
subcarrier can be modulated using BPSK, QPSK, 16-QAM, or 64-QAM modulation etc.,
depending on the transmitted data rate requested. In this paper, QPSK is chosen to analyze the

, 0 E ( ck , n ck ' , m' =) ,0
4
SCD of OFDM signal. Therefore, ck , n ∈ {exp( j2π p/ 4)}
*
p =1 ， E ( ck , n )= E ( c k , n ) =

* ' '
E ( ck , n ck ' , n ' =) δ [ k− k ]δ [ n ，(
−n ]E denotes the expectation operator, * denotes conjugate).

The general expression for the SCD of a carrier modulated signal

x(t ) = Re(r (t )exp( j (2π f ct + φo )) can be verified as:
α 1 α α α − 2 fc j2 o φ 2 fc α + j2o − φ
S x ( f)= [ Srr ( f − fc ) +Srr ( f fc +) S + ( f fc ) e* − S +( f f (3)
c
)e ]+
r* r r r
4
 where S rr ( f ) denotes spectral autocorrelation density of r (t ) and S rr ( fc ) denotes spectral
α α

crosscorrelation density of r (t ) and r * (t ) , the subscript α denotes cyclic frequency. For OFDM

α
so we only need to deduce S rr ( f ) . From equation (2), r (t ) can be expressed
α
signal, S *
r r
(f) = 0,

as:
N ST / 2 ∞ N ST/ 2
r (t ) = ∑ /2{ ∑ c
k =− N ST n =−∞
k ,n e j 2π k ∆f ( − nTs −to ) q (t − nTs − to )}e j 2π k ∆ft = ∑
k =− N ST/ 2
gk (t )e j 2π k ∆ft (4)

where g k (t ) = ∑c k ,n
e
j 2 π k ∆f ( − nTs − to )
q (t − nT s − t o ) is the mathematical expression of an OFDM
n =−∞

subcarrier signal. In [5], the general expression for the SCD of a digital signal
∞
y (t ) = ∑a qn(t− nT− st ) o is presented as
n =−∞
^
S αy ( f ) =
σ 2a e− j 2πα to Q( f + α / 2)Q* ( f − α / 2),α = m / T
Ts s (5)

where an satisfy E ( an ) = 0; E[ an ak ] = σ aδ [ n − k ] , Q ( f ) is the Fourier transform of the pulse

* 2

shape q (t ) and m ∈ Z , m = [L − 1, 0,1, L ] . With this result, the SCD of g k (t ) will be:

1 − j 2 π ( α k + fo ) ∆t
S α gk ( f)= e α( f
Q *
/ +2 ) Q ( fα / 2 ),α− m/ Ts
(6) =
Ts
In the OFDM system, the complex signals at each subcarrier in each symbol period are
statistically independent and orthogonal of each other. They are also independent and
orthogonal of the values modulating any subcarrier in any previous or subsequent symbol period
[6]. As a result, the SCD of the overall signal can be found by summing the cyclic spectra of all
individual subcarriers for any symbol period. Therefore, the SCD of r (t ) can be expressed as
 1 ST [e − j 2π (α +k ∆f ) to Q ( f − k∆ f + α
N /2

 T k = −∑ / 2)
N ST / 2
 s NST / 2
S
α
rr
(f)= ∑ S
α
gk
(f) = * (7)
k = − N ST / 2
⋅Q ( f − k ∆f −α / 2)], α = m / Ts
 0, ot hers
Substitute (7) into (3):
 1 − j 2π α ot NST / 2
{ ∑
j 2 − k πfto ∆
 4T e e +Q( f − fc ∆ α k + f / 2)
 s k = − NST / 2


 *
N ST / 2

/−2)∑
− j 2π k oft∆
Ssα ( f )=  ⋅Q ( f +fc k− fα ∆ + e (8)
 k = − NST / 2

 ⋅Q( f − fc k− fα∆ +/ *2) Q ( f fc −k f − α/ ∆2)},s− αm / T =


 0, ot her s

The SCD of OFDM signal (equation (7) and (8) ) has some obvious characteristics:
1. The SCD of an OFDM subcarrier is only affected by the symbol shaping pulses, symbol
rate and delay time, no matter what other parameters are in the system;
 2. The SCD of the overall signal appears slices along α axis since α = m / Ts is discrete

value. And the SCD equals to the common power spectral density (PSD) of OFDM, when α
equals to zero.
3. If the received signals are represented by x (t ) = s (t ) + n(t ) , where, n(t) is the WGN, x(t)
and n(t) are independent each other. The SCD of the noise is not identically zero only at α = 0
due to its stationarity.

3. SIMULATIONS RESULTS
A pulse shaping QPSK-OFDM system is simulated with N ST = 64 , symbol rate

fb = 1/ Ts = 256( Hz ) , sample rate fs=fb*64, cyclic frequency space ∆α = 8( Hz ) , spectrum

frequency space ∆f = 1024( Hz ) . Wave shaping pulse is full-duty-cycle rectangle pulse, i.e.

q ( t ) = 1, t ≤ Ts / 2 . And FFT accumulation method (FAM) [5] is utilized to estimate the SCD of

OFDM signals. Fig.2 is a surface plot of the SCD estimate magnitude in bi-frequency plane
with coordinates f and α . The surface appears only at the region specified by equation (8).

Fig.3 is a two-dimensional slice of the SCD estimate magnitude for f = − fc . There are obvious

spectral lines at α = m / Ts in Fig.3, and we can utilize these spectral lines to blind estimate the

symbol rate (1/Ts).

Fig.2 Surface plot of the SCD estimate magnitude for QPSK-OFDM signal, using FAM method.
 P
rofileo
fOF
DMu
sin
gFA
M

2
500

2
000

1
/Ts α=
1/T
s
Sx 1
500

1
000

5
00

-5
00
-2
000 -1
500 -1
000 -5
00 0 5
00 1
000 1
500 2
000 2
500
f=
-fc
(Hz), α

Fig.3 Two-dimensional slice of the SCD function estimate for f = − fc

Fig.4 is a surface plot of the SCD estimate magnitude of OFDM signal disturbed by WGN
noise. It clearly shows that the noise surface appears only at α = 0 due to its stationarity. Fig .5

is the two-dimensional slice of the SCD estimate magnitude for f = − fc when SNR=0 dB. The

spectral line is still clear even in the low signal-to-noise ratio. The results given in Fig.2~Fig.4
validate the theoretical analysis in this paper.

Fig.4 Surface plot of the SCD estimate magnitude of OFDM signal impaired by stationary noise
P
r
ofile
ofO
FD
Mu
sin
gFA
M

3
50
0

3
00
0

2
50
0

1
/T
s
2
00
0 α=
1/T
s
Sx

1
50
0

1
00
0

5
00

-
500

-
100
0 -
500 0 5
00 1
00
0 1
50
0 2
00
0
f
=-f
c(H
z)
, α
 Fig.5 Two-dimensional slice of the SCD function estimate for f = − fc when SNR=0dB

4. CONCLUSIONS
Our results show that the SCD of the OFDM subcarrier is only affected by the symbol
shaping pulses, symbol rate and delay time, no matter what other parameters are in the system,
and the SCD of the overall signal can be found by summing the cyclic spectra of all individual
subcarriers since the subcarriers in each symbol period are statistically independent and
orthogonal of each other. The SCD of the overall signal appears slices along α axis since

α = m / Ts is discrete value. And when OFDM signal is impaired by stationary noise, the noise

influence appears only at α = 0 . Thus those signal processing applications based

cyclostationarity of OFDM signal will be robust in the presence of stationary noise.

REFERENCE:

[1] Helmut BÖlcskei:’Blind estimation of symbol timing and carrier frequency offset in wireless OFDM
systems’, IEEE Trans. Communications, 2001,49,(6), pp.988-999.
[2] Robert W.Heath, Jr. and Georios B.Giannakis:’Exploiting input cyclostationarity for blind channel
identification in OFDM systems’, IEEE Trans. Signal processing,1999,47,(3),pp.848-856.
[3] IEEE: ‘Supplement to Standard for Information Technology—Telecommunications and Information
Exchange Between Systems—Local and Metropolitan Area Networks—Specific Requirements. Part
11:Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer.
(PHY) Specifications: High Speed Physical Layer in the 5 GHz Band’,Std. 802.11a, September 1999
[4] Richard van Nee Ramjee Prasad:’ OFDM for wireless multimedia communications’, 2000, Artech
House, Boston, London.
[5] Gardner W A:’Statistical spectral analysis: a nonprobabilistic theory’, 1987, Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall.
[6] C.Liu and F.Li:’Spectrum modeling of OFDM signals for WLAN’, IEE Electronics Letters, 2004, 40,
(22), pp1431－1432.