Cyclic Prefix Optimization of OFDM System

Abstract

There are many methods to reduce the multipath effects in wireless communication. Multicarrier modulation for data transmission is one of the methods to overcome the effect of Inter Symbol Interference (ISI), also known as Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM). The analysis of Bit Error Rate (BER) performance suggests, OFDM is better than Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) which is mostly incorporated in existing 3G systems.[1]In this article the influence of cyclic prefix and pilot insertion technique on an OFDM system is analyzed on an AWGN channel. The OFDM system is simulated with MATLAB programming as well as simulink model , and the BER curves with and without CP/PI are compared. The variance of power loss and information rate loss with length of the cyclic prefix is explained.