Performance Analysis of OFDM in Combating Multipath Fading

IOSR Journal of Electronics and Communication Engineering (IOSR-JECE)
e-ISSN: 2278-2834,p- ISSN: 2278-8735.Volume 6, Issue 2 (May. - Jun. 2013), PP 99-107
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www.iosrjournals.org 99 | Page
Performance Analysis of OFDM in Combating Multipath Fading
Adewuyi O.S1
, Lawal W.2
, Ogunti E.O.3
Department of Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Federal university of Technology Akure, Ondo State Nigeria
Department of Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Rufus Giwa Polytechnics Owo, Ondo State, Nigeria
Department of Electrical/Electronic Engineering, Federal university of Technology Akure, Ondo State
NigeriaThanks
Abstract: Mobile Communication system has been on high rampage for high data transmission over wireless
medium with various challenges caused by the transmission Channel. OFDM is been discovered in recent years
to deal with this problems because of its ability to elegantly cope with multipath interference. This paper
investigates the performance of different modulation schemes using M-ary Phase Shift Keying (M-PSK) and M-
ary Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (M-QAM) in information transmission with OFDM technique over Ideal
channel AWGN and worst channel Rayleigh Fading channel in terms of Bits Error Rate (BER). Analysis was
made for different types of modulation schemes BPSK, QPSK, 4-QAM and 16-QAM gray coded bit mapping.
Also, a feasibility of OFDM been used to combat multipath fading was analyzed with comparison between a
single carrier technique and OFDM multicarrier technique. Variation between SNR results with respect to BER
is plotted to show the trade off differences between the modulation schemes with the result showing that OFDM
allows data transmission with minimal error over fading channel than a Single Carrier.
Keywords: OFDM, Single Carrier, AWGN, Rayleigh fading, BER, M-ary PSK, M-ary QAM
I. Introduction
The concept of OFDM in term of parallel data transmission and frequency division multiplexing was
first developed in the 50s [1, 2] and introduced in some papers in the mid 60s [3]. Although the idea of
OFDM started back in 1966, it has never been widely utilized until the last decade when it “becomes the
modem of choice in wireless applications” [4]. OFDM can be seen as either a modulation technique or a
multiplexing technique allowing high speeds at wireless communications; its hierarchy corresponds to the
physical and medium access layer. OFDM as a multicarrier technique is used to increase the robustness
against frequency selective fading or narrowband interference.
In a single carrier system, a single fade or interfere can cause the entire link to fail, but in OFDM
multicarrier system, only a small percentage of the subcarriers will be affected. Data to be transmitted in OFDM
is typically in the form of a serial data stream and since OFDM transmits data as a set of parallel low bandwidth
(100Hz – 50 kHz), hence a serial to parallel conversion is needed to divide the serial data into parallel sub
carriers. OFDM provides high bandwidth efficiency because the subcarriers are orthogonal to each other. This
made the carrier to be independent of each other even though their spectral overlap. The frequency spacing
between the sub carriers is made to be the reciprocal of the useful symbol.
An important component in OFDM that makes its subcarrier to each other is Discrete Fourier
Transform (DFT) which is been replaced by Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT) because IFFT is cost
effective to implement. IFFT converts the symbols in frequency domain to time domain at the transmitter while
Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) is been used at the receiver to convert back from time domain to frequency
domain. High data rate systems are achieved by using a large number of carriers. Other components a basic
OFDM system will contain are modulation scheme a QAM or PSK modulator or demodulator, a serial to
parallel converter and a parallel to serial converter.
However, since OFDM has proved to be very effective in mitigating adverse multipath effects of a
broadband wireless channel, counteracting the frequency selectivity of multipath channels by multiplexing
information on different orthogonal carriers, it now becomes the underlying technology for various new
applications such as digital audio broadcast (DAB) () and for Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) in Europe and
Australia. Other areas of OFDM applications are wireless LAN (802.11a&g, 802.16a&b, Wimax and Hiper
LAN-2), broadband wireless (MMDS, LMDS), xDSL, and home networking.
Modulation schemes in OFDM are used to cover data rates for various needs. Modulation mapping rate
are dynamically adapted based on channel condition to increase the system performance in terms of Bit Error
Rate (BER). Gray bit mapping is been used in different modulation schemes for the bit constellation of the
transmitted bits to be rearranged thereby making every adjacent bits differ by one bit.
This paper now presents the average Bit Error Rate for different modulation schemes trying to see which
is the best modulation scheme to use under an idea AWGN and worst channel Rayleigh fading channel using

some forward error corrections such as Concatenated Reed Solomon and Convolutional Encoder with General
interleaver.
The paper is divided into sections; section II will discuss OFDM system, Propagation Characteristics of
Mobile Radio Channels, and mathematical model. In section III, simulations and results are presented. Finally,
conclusion is sdrawn in the last section of this paper.
OFDM
The next generation of wireless communication, that is 4G has adopted OFDM as their physical layer
because OFDM efficiently utilize multiple performance for 4G [M. Nakagami, 1960].The growing demand for
modulated carriers tightly together reducing the required bandwidth but keeping the modulated signals
orthogonal so that they do not interfere with each other. OFDM that is highly efficient technique shows
favorable properties such as robustness to channel fading and inter symbol interference (ISI) and is immune to
noise. OFDM system is capable of mitigating a frequency selective fading channel to a set of parallel flat fading.
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is a multicarrier transmission technique, many
carriers, each one being modulated by a low rate data stream share the transmission bandwidth. OFDM is
similar to FDMA in that the multiple user access is achieved by subdividing the available bandwidth into
multiple channels that are then allocated to users. However, OFDM uses the spectrum much more efficiently by
spacing the channels much closer together. This is achieved by making all the carriers orthogonal to one
another, preventing interference between the closely spaced carriers.
Unlike the conventional multicarrier communication scheme in which spectrum of each subcarrier is
non-overlapping and band, pass filtering is used to extract the frequency of interest, in OFDM the frequency
spacing between subcarriers is selected such that the subcarriers are mathematically orthogonal to each other‟s.
The spectra of subcarriers overlap each other but individual subcarrier can be extracted by baseband processing.
This overlapping property makes OFDM more spectral efficient than the conventional multicarrier
communication scheme.
Figure 1: Concept of OFDM Signal: Orthogonal Multicarrier Technique versus Conventional Multicarrier
Techniques.
Orthogonality of OFDM
The main concept in OFDM is Orthogonality of the subcarriers. Since the carriers are all sine and
cosine waves, area under one period of a sine or cosine wave is Zero. Taking a sine wave of frequency m and
multiplying it by a sinusoid (sine/cosine) of a frequency n, where m and n are integers, the integral or the area
under this product is given by:
𝑓 𝑡 = 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑚𝜔𝑡 ∗ 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑛𝜔𝑡 (1)
By the simple trigonometry relationship, this is equal to a sum of two sinusoids of frequencies (m-n)
and (m+n) given as:
=
1
2
cos 𝑚 − 𝑛 −
1
2
(2)
Equation (2) shows that the two frequencies components are sinusoids; hence integrating them over
one period gives zero:
1
2
cos 𝑚 − 𝑛 𝜔𝑡 −
1
2
cos 𝑚 + 𝑛 𝜔𝑡 (
2𝜋
0
2𝜋
0
3)
= 0 − 0

Therefore, it can be concluded that when a sinusoid of a frequency n is multiplied by sinusoid of
frequency m/n, the area under the product is zero. Integral for all integer n and m, sinm𝓍, cosm𝓍, cosn𝓍, sinn𝓍,
are all orthogonal to each other. These frequencies are called harmonics.
In a simple way it can be put that, two periodic signals are orthogonal when the integral of their
product, over one period, is equal to zero. This is true of certain sinusoids as illustrated in the equations below:
Continuous Time
cos 2𝜋𝑛𝑓𝑜 𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2𝜋𝑚𝑓𝑜 𝑡 𝑑𝑡 = 0 𝑛 ≠ 𝑚 (4)
𝜏
0
Discrete Time
𝑐𝑜𝑠
2𝜋𝑘𝑛
𝑁
𝑐𝑜𝑠
2𝜋𝑘𝑚
𝑁
𝑁−1
0 = 0 𝑛 ≠ 𝑚 (5)
The carriers of an OFDM are sinusoids that meet this requirement because each one is a multiple of
frequency. Each one has an integer number of cycles in the fundamental period. If the dot product of two
deterministic signals is equal to zero, these signals are said to be orthogonal to each other.
1.3 Mathematical Model of OFDM System.
The basic idea of OFDM is to divide the available spectrum into several sub channels (subcarriers) by
making all sub channels narrowband, they experience almost flat fading, which makes equalization very simple
or may not require equalization. To obtain a high spectral efficiency the frequency response of the sub-channels
are overlapping and orthogonal, hence the name OFDM. This orthogonality can be completely maintained, even
though the signal passes through a time dispersive channel, by introducing a cyclic prefix [6]. There are several
versions of OFDM, [7, 8, 9] but this research focus on systems using such a cyclic prefix [10]. A cyclic prefix
is a copy of the last part of the OFDM symbol, which is presented to the transmitted symbol. This makes the
transmitted signal periodic, which plays a decisive role in avoiding intersymbol and intercarrier interference [7].
Starting with the waveforms used in the transmitter and proceeding all the way to the receiver, the
description goes thus:
Transmitter
Assuming an OFDM system with N subcarriers, a bandwidth of Q Hz and symbol length of T seconds,
of which Tcp seconds is the length of the cyclic prefix, the transmitter uses the following waveforms:
𝜙𝜅 𝑡
=
1
𝑇 − 𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑒 𝑗2𝜋 𝑘(𝑡−𝑇 𝑐𝑝 ) if t ϵ 0 T𝑁
𝜔
0 𝑜𝑡𝑕𝑒𝑟𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑒
(6)
Where 𝑇 =
𝑁
𝑊
+ 𝑇𝑐𝑝. Note that ∅𝑡 (𝑡) = ∅ 𝑘 𝑡 +
𝑁
𝑊
, where T is within the cyclic prefix 0, 𝑇𝑐𝑝 since ∅ 𝑘 (𝑡)
is the rectangular pulse modulated on the carrier frequency
𝐾𝑊
𝑁
, the common interpretation of OFDM is that it
uses N subcarriers, each carrying a low-bit rate. Now the transmitted baseband signal for OFDM symbol
number l is:
𝑠𝑡 𝑡
= 𝑥 𝑘
𝑁−1
𝑘=0
, ℓ∅ 𝑘 𝑡−ℓ𝑇
(7)
Where 𝑥0, ℓ, 𝑥1, ℓ … … … … 𝑥 𝑁−1 are complex symbols from the set of signal constellation points. When an
infinite sequence of OFDM symbols is transmitted, the output from the transmitter is a juxtaposition of
individual OFDM symbols:
𝑠 𝑡 = 𝑠ℓ 𝑡 = 𝑥 𝑘,ℓ∅ 𝑘
𝑡 − ℓ𝑇
𝑁−1
𝑘=0
+∞
ℓ=−∞
∞
ℓ=−∞
(8)
Physical Channel
An assumption that the support of possibly time variant impulse response g(𝜏;t) of the physical channel
is restricted to the interval 𝜏 ∈ [0, 𝑇𝑐𝑝 ] i.e to the length of the cyclic prefix. The received signal becomes:
𝑟 𝑡 = 𝑔 𝜏, 𝑡 ∗ 𝑠 𝑡 + 𝑛 𝑡 = 𝑔 𝜏; 𝑡 𝑠 𝑡 − 𝜏 𝑑𝜏 + ṅ 𝑡 (9)
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
Where ṅ 𝑡 is additive white, complex Gaussian channel noise.
Receiver
In an OFDM receiver, a filter bank is matched to the last part [𝑇𝑐𝑝 , 𝑇] of the transmitter waveforms
∅ 𝑘 𝑡 , 𝑖. 𝑒

𝜓 𝑘 𝑡
=
𝜙∗
𝑇 − 𝑡 𝑖𝑓 𝑡 𝜖 [0, 𝑇 − 𝑇𝑐𝑝 ]
0 𝑜𝑡𝑕𝑒𝑟𝑤𝑖𝑠𝑒
(10)
From the equation above, it is been observed that the cyclic prefix is removed at the receiver. Since the
cyclic prefix contains all ISI from the previous symbol, the sampled output from the reciver filter bank contains
no ISI. Therefore, the time index when calculating the sampled output at the kth matched filter.
When we consider equations, we arrive at
𝑦 𝑘 = ( 𝑔(𝜏; 𝑡) 𝑥 𝑘′∅ 𝑘′(𝑡 − 𝜏)]𝑑𝜏 ∅ 𝑘
∗
(𝑡) 𝑑𝑡 + ℏ 𝑇 − 𝑡 ∅ 𝑘
∗
(𝑡) 𝑑𝑡
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑁−1
𝑘′=0
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
(11)
Considering the channel to be fixed over the OFDM symbol interval is denoted by which gives
𝑦 𝑘 = 𝑥 𝑘′
𝑁−1
𝑘′=0
( 𝑔 𝜏
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
∅ 𝑘′(𝑡 − 𝜏)]𝑑𝜏 ∅ 𝑘
∗
(𝑡) 𝑑𝑡 + ℏ 𝑇 − 𝑡 ∅ 𝑘
∗
𝑡 𝑑𝑡
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
(12)
The integration intervals are and which implies that
and the inner integral can be written as:
( 𝑔 𝜏
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
∅ 𝑘′(𝑡 − 𝜏)]𝑑𝜏 = 𝑔 𝜏
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑒 𝑗2𝜋𝑘′ 𝑡−𝜏−𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑊
𝑁
𝑑𝜏 =
𝑒 𝑗2𝜋𝑘′ 𝑡−𝜏−𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑊
𝑁
𝑔 𝜏
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑒−𝑗2𝜋𝑘
′
𝑊
𝑁
𝑑𝜏 ,
𝑇𝑐𝑝 < 𝑡
< 𝑇 (13)
The latter part of this expression is the sampled frequency response of the channel at frequency
at the th subcarrier frequency:
𝑕 𝑘′ = 𝐺 𝑘′ 𝑊
𝑁
= 𝑔 𝜏
𝑇𝑐𝑝
0
𝑒−𝑗2𝜋𝑘
′
𝑊
𝑁
𝑑𝜏 ,
(14)
Where is the fourier transform of Using this notation the output from the reciver filter bank can be
smplified to
𝑦 𝑘 = 𝑥 𝑘′
𝑁−1
𝑘′=0
𝑒 𝑗2𝜋𝑘′ 𝑡−𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑊
𝑁
𝑕 𝑘′ ∅ 𝑘
∗
𝑡 𝑑𝑡 + ℏ
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑇 − 𝑡 𝑕 𝑘′ ∅ 𝑘
∗
𝑡 𝑑𝑡
= 𝑥 𝑘′
𝑁−1
𝑘′=0
𝑕 𝑘′ ∅ 𝑘′ 𝑡
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
∅ 𝑘
∗
𝑡 𝑑𝑡 + 𝑛 𝑘 (15)
Where
Since the transmitter filters are orthogonal,
∅ 𝑘′ 𝑡
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
∅ 𝑘
∗
𝑡 𝑑𝑡 =
𝑒 𝑗2𝜋𝑘′ 𝑡−𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑊
𝑁
𝑇
𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑒−𝑗2𝜋𝑘′ 𝑡−𝑇𝑐𝑝
𝑊
𝑁
𝑑𝑡 = 𝛿 𝑘 − 𝑘′
(16)
Where is the Kronecker delta function (Oppenheim and Schafer, 1989), equation (15) can be simplified to
obtain
𝑦 𝑘 = 𝑕 𝑘 𝑥 𝑘 + 𝑛 𝑘 (17)
Where is the additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN).
The benefit of cyclic prefix is to avoid ISI since it acts as a guard interval and ICI because it maintains
the orthogonality of the sub carriers.
Discrete-time model
In discrete time model, as compared to continuous time model, an inverse DFT (IDFT) and a DFT
respectively replace the modulation and demodulation, and the channel is a discrete time convolution. The
cyclic prefix operates in the same fashion and the calculations can be performed in essentially the same way.
The main difference is that all integrals are replaced by sums. From the receiver‟s point of view, the use of a
cyclic prefix longer than the channel will transform the linear convolution in the channel to a cyclic convolution.
Denoting cyclic convolution by‟ ‟ the whole OFDM system can be written as:
=
(18)

Where contains N received data points, the N transmitted constellation points, the impulse
response of the channel (padded with zero to obtain a length of N), and the channel noise. Since the channel
noise is assumed white and Gaussian, the term = DFT ( ) represents the uncorrelated Gaussian noise.
Further, we use that the DFT of two cyclically convolved signals is equivalent to the product of their individual
DFTs. Denoting element-by-element multiplication by (.), the above expression can be written
(19)
Where DFT ( ) is the frequency response of the channel. Thus, we have obtained the same
type of parallel Gaussian channels as for the continuous-time model. The only difference is the channel
attenuations are given by the N point DFT of the discrete time channel, instead of the sampled frequency
response as in Equation (17).
1.4 Propagation Characteristics of Mobile Radio Channels
Channel Fading Techniques
The physical medium between the transmitter and receiver is known as channel. Radio channel is the
link between the transmitter and the receiver that carries information bearing signal in the form of
electromagnetic waves. Scatters (local to the receiver) and reflectors (local to the transmitter) commonly
characterize the radio channel. Small-scale fading, or simply fading, is used to describe the rapid fluctuations of
the amplitude of a radio signal over a short period or travel distance, so that large-scale path loss effects may be
ignored.
This channel results in random delay (random phase shift) with total a factor. Channels may be three types as
tabulated below
Type Descriptions Example
Simplex One way only FM radio, television
Half duplex Two way, only one at a
time
Police Radio
Full duplex Two way, both at the same
time
Mobile systems
Table1.Types of Channels with examples.
Attenuation
Attenuation can be described as the drop in the signal power when signal is been transmitted from one
point to another. Transmission path length, obstructions in the signal path, and multipath effects are the major
factors causing attenuation. Any objects, which obstruct the line of sight signal from the transmitter to the
receiver, can cause attenuation. The most important environmental attenuation factor generally caused by
buildings and hills is Shadowing. Shadowing of the signal can occur whenever there is an obstruction between
the transmitter and receiver, especially in heavily built up areas with much building shadows.
Diffraction is the bending of a radio signal towards a solid obstruction. Radio signals diffract off the
boundaries of obstruction, thus preventing total shadowing of the signals behind hills and buildings. Hills can
cause a large problem due to the large shadow they produce. However, the amount of diffraction is dependent
on the radio frequency used, with low frequencies diffracting more than high frequency signals. Hence, for
adequate signal strength, Ultra High Frequencies (UHF), and microwave signals require line of sight. More so,
to overcome the problem of shadowing, transmitters are usually elevated as high as possible to minimize the
number of obstruction. The typical amounts of variation in attenuation due to shadowing are shown in the table
2 below [11].
Description Typical Attenuation due to Shadowing
Heavy built-up urban
center
20dB variation from street to street
Sub-urban area (fewer
large buildings)
10dB greater signal power then built-up urban
center
Open rural area 20dB greater signal power then sub-areas
Terrain irregularities and
tree foliage
3-12dB signal power variation.
Table 2: Typical Attenuation in Radio Channel [11]

Multipath Effects.
In mobile communications, the signal is degraded by terrestrial multipath fading in the lower
atmosphere known as troposphere [12].This troposphere is between altitude of 0 and 70 km and consists of
many objects such as buildings, mountains, trees, moving cars, sign posts at the ground surface and natural
phenomena like temperature, humidity, rainfall, etc at above the ground surface. These artificial and natural
phenomena obstruct the transmitted signal, hindered the signal to reflect, refract, diffract and scatter, and move
in different paths called multipath propagation causing the received signal to be degraded. The different paths
add up constructively when the received signal paths are in phase and destructively under unfavourable phase
conditions. The effects of terrestrial multipath propagation are signal fading, delay spread which is very
dominant in urban environment leading to intersymbol interference (ISI) distortion, and lastly the doppler spread
which occurs when there is relative motion in terrestrial environment. Therefore, these result in signal
fluctuation at the receiver [13]. In wireless channel, the medium is the free space. In this case, there is no
specified or particular path for signal transmission. The transmitted signal may be reflected from many things
like hills, trees, etc before being received at the destined receiver. This can give rise to multiple transmission
paths up to the receiver. The relative phase of the multiple reflected signals causes destructive or constructive
interference at the receiver. This is normally experienced for very short distances (typically at half of the
wavelength distances), thus is given the term - fast fading. This variation can vary from10 to 30dB [over short
distances [14].
Fading Statistics in Radio Channel
In communications systems, fading occurs due to the multipath propagation. As a result, signals
reaching the receiver from several different paths that may have different lengths corresponding to different time
delays and gains. Time delay causes additional phase shifts to the main signal component. Therefore, the signal
reaching the receiver is the sum of some copies of the original signal with different delays and gains. With this
explanation, the channel impulse response can be modelled as described in [15] with the equation given below:
𝑕 𝑐 𝑡 = 𝛼 𝑘 𝛿(𝑡 −𝐾−1
𝐾=0
𝜏𝑘) (20)
Where:
𝛼 𝑘 = Complex path gain
𝑘 = Number of paths
𝜏 𝑘 = Path delay
Fading can be classified into two different scales:
Small Scale fading: small-scale fading happens in very short time duration, is caused by reflectors, and scatters
that change the amplitude, phase and angle of the arriving signal. Rayleigh distribution and Rician distribution
are often used to define small scale fading.
Large Scale fading: Large-scale fading is due to shadowing and the mobile station should move over a large
distance to overcome the effects of shadowing. Log-normal distribution is often used to define large-scale
fading.
Fast Fading
In a fast fading channel, the rate of change of the channel is higher than the signal symbol period and
hence the channel changes over one period. In other words, the channel coherence time 𝑇𝑐 , is smaller than the
symbol period𝑇𝑠. 𝑇𝑐 is related to the Doppler spread,𝑓𝑑 , as:
𝑇𝑐=0.423/𝑓𝑑 (21)
From this relation it is clear that a high Doppler spread results in a smaller channel coherence time. The
coherence time of 0.423ms corresponding to a 𝑓𝑑 of 1 kHz is clear.
1.4.6 Slow Fading
As the name suggests, in a slow fading channel, the channel coherence time is larger than the symbol
period and hence the channel remains approximately static over a symbol or multiple symbols. From the above
equation it is clear that slow fading is usually expected with low Doppler spread values; i.e. with slower moving
obstacles and receiver/transmitter. Multipath delay spread based and Doppler spread based fades are completely
independent of each other and hence is quite possible to have a flat, fast fading channel or a flat, slow fading
channel; and so on.

Additive White Gaussian Noise
Zero-mean white Gaussian Noise (WGN) has the same power spectral density AWGN (f) for all
frequencies. The adjective „white‟ is used in the sense that white light contains equal amounts of all frequencies
within the visible band of electromagnetic radiation. The autocorrelation function of WGN is given by the
inverse Fourier transform of the noise power spectral density GWGN (f): The autocorrelation function RaWGN
(t) is zero for t 0. This means that any two different samples of WGN, no matter how close together in time
they are taken, are uncorrelated. The noise signal WGN (t) is totally decorrelated from its time-shifted version
for any t 0.
Fig 2. Signal with AWGN Noise
The amplitude of „integrated‟ (bandwidth) WGN has a Gaussian probability density distribution P
(WGNi).Noise exists in all communications systems operating over an analog physical channel, such as radio.
The main sources are thermal background noise, electrical noise in the receiver amplifiers, & inter-cellular
interference.
Rayleigh Fading Distribution
Rayleigh distributions are defined for fading of a channel when all the received signals are reflected
signals and there is no dominant component. The Rayleigh distribution has a Probability Density Functions
(PDF) given as: [18].
𝑝 𝑟 =
𝑟
𝜎2 exp −
𝑟2
2𝜎2 (0 ≤ 𝑟)
0 (𝑟 ≤ 0)
(22)
Where 𝜎 is the Root Mean Square (RMS) value of voltage in a received signal and 𝜎2
is the time-
average power of the received signal. The Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF) is defined to specify the
probability that the received signal does not exceed a specific threshold R. The CDF is given by [16]
𝑃 𝑅 = 𝑃 𝑟 ≤ 𝑅 = 𝑝 𝑟 𝑑𝑟 = 1 − exp −
𝑅2
2𝜎2 (23)
𝑅
0
The Rayleigh distribution is commonly used to describe the statistical time varying nature of the
received signal power. It describes the probability of the signal level being received due to fading.
The central limit theorem will give the channel the statistical characteristics of a Rayleigh Distribution.
Fig. 3: Rayleigh distribution

II. Simulation Results And Discurssion
In this paper, analysis of the performance of different modulation schemes with gray coded bit mapping
over AWGN and Rayleigh fading Channel with OFDM technique is performed using MATLAB SIMULINK.
The diagram below shows the typical block diagram of an OFDM system.
Fig 4: The OFDM Model block diagram.
1. Required Bandwidth 20 MHz
2. Sampling Frequency 20 MHz
3. Carrier Modulation Used BPSK, QPSK, 4QAM, 16QAM.
4. Number of FFT size (𝑁𝑓𝑓𝑡 ) 256
5. Number of data subcarrier (𝑁𝑆𝐷) 200
6. Number of pilot subcarrier (𝑁𝑆𝑃) 28
Table 3 the Simulation Parameters for OFDM Transceiver
Fig 5: Single Carrier Modulation Schemes over Multipath Rayleigh Fading Channel.
Fig 6: Single Carrier Modulation Schemes over AWGN Channel.
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
10
-4
10
-3
10
-2
10
-1
10
0
EbNo [dB]
BER
BPSK
QPSK
4QAM
16QAM
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
10
-4
10
-3
10
-2
10
-1
10
0
EbNo [dB]
BER
BPSK
QPSK
4QAM
16QAM

Fig 7: BER versus SNR Curve for OFDM technique in Multipath Rayleigh fading Channel with different
modulation Schemes.
Fig 5 and Fig 7 above show the effect of multipath fading channel on data transmission and the
feasibility of using OFDM Schemes to combat the effect of fading. A single fade or interferer in a single carrier
system of fig 5 can cause the entire link to fail hence not making the graph to converge due to much attenuation
and loss of transmitted bits that occur at the multipath channel. Hence, the BER is high in a Single Carrier
System. Fig 6 shows Single carrier converges easily over the AWGN Channel because it is an idea Channel with
noise and no delay spread. This establishes the fact that OFDM is used in combating frequency selective fading
channel and not AWGN.
However, the effect of Multipath Rayleigh Fading channel to the performance of the OFDM system for
four modulation techniques namely BPSK, QPSK, 4-QAM and 16-QAM are shown in the figure 6. It can be
observed from the above figure that, to achieve a BER of 10-5
, the OFDM model system with BPSK modulation
needs at least a SNR of 20dB, the OFDM system when using QPSK modulation needs at least 34dB, the OFDM
system with 4-QAM modulation needs at least SNR around 32dB and the OFDM system for 16-QAM
modulation needs at least SNR around 38dB.
III. Conclusion
Analysis was made on a Single Carrier technique and OFDM multicarrier technique. It has been shown
that OFDM allows data transmission with minimal error over fading channel than a Single Carrier. In addition,
performances of different modulation scheme for BPSK, QPSK, 4-QAM, and 16-QAM has been analyzed. It
can be deduced hence that in a channel with high interference, a small modulation scheme like BPSK is
favourable since it requires a low signal to noise ratio (SNR) in the receiver but with low data rate. However, in
an interference free channel, a larger constellation modulation scheme (16-QAM) is more beneficial due to the
higher bit rate.
References
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Signalling Schemes in Fast and Frequency Non- Selective Rayleigh fading channel with Decision Feedback Equalizer (DFE) at the
Receiver‘ Advanced Materials Research, Trans Tech Publications, Switzerland,vols.62- 64, pp.99-104.(2009)
[14] Schulze, Henrik and Christian Luders, Theory and Applications of OFDM and CDMA John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. (2005)
[15] A. F. Molisch, (2005) Wireless Communications. IEEE-Press - Wiley and Sons.
[16] T. S. Rappaport, (1996) Wireless Communications: Principle and Practice. NJ: Prentice-Hall.
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
10
-4
10
-3
10
-2
10
-1
10
0
EbNo [dB]
BER
OFDM-BPSK
OFDM-QPSK
OFDM-4QAM
OFDM-16QAM

Performance Analysis of OFDM in Combating Multipath Fading

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