Sensitivity of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexed systems to carrier and clock synchronization errors

In this contribution, we present an overview of research results pertaining to the sensitivity of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexed (OFDM) sys tems to synchronization errors. We show that OFDM systems are quite sensiti ve to carrier frequency offset and clock frequency offset: in the presence of these impairments, the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the input of the d ecision device is a decreasing function of the number of carriers. On the o ther hand, carrier phase jitter and timing jitter give rise to a degradatio n of the SNR at the input of the decision device which does not depend on t he number of carriers; as compared to traditional single-carrier systems, O FDM systems have the same sensitivity to carrier phase jitter and a somewha t larger sensitivity to timing jitter. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All r ights reserved.