Channel-Matched OFDM (CM-OFDM) for Enhanced Performance of Multiuser Systems Operating in Underwater Acoustic Channels

Abstract

The design of multiuser OFDM underwater acoustic (UWA) communication systems is very challenging due to the time-varying and frequency selective fading of UWA channels. The key for ensuring a reliable optimum transmission for every user is the suitable resource assignment for each. This paper proposes a new adaptive channel- matched OFDM scheme (CM-OFDM) to overcome the performance degradation caused by the frequency selective fading across the OFDM subcarriers. In the proposed scheme, the OFDM subcarriers are sorted depending on their corresponding channel gains. Then the resource assignment to the different users is accomplished according to their required quality of service (QOS). The user with the highest QOS is assigned the best subcarriers and the other users are similarly assigned the remaining subcarriers. This optimized resource assignment technique guarantees enhanced performance with no need of increasing the transmitted power or changing the modulation schemes. The performance of the proposed technique is investigated and is compared with uniform and random subcarriers’ assignment methods used for multiuser OFDM systems. The simulations are performed for a multipath frequency selective UWA channel model. The simulation results clearly show the advantages of CM-OFDM scheme for the users with high QOS on the expense of a slight degradation in the performance for the other user with lower QOS.