About UW-OFDM

On uwofdm.jku.at

This website should serve as a central hub that provides all relevant information on UW-OFDM. We aim at collecting all research activities currently going on around the globe on this topic. Additionally, Matlab code examples and a FAQ section should ease the introduction to this novel signaling framework.

Furthermore, the section project updates will keep you informed about news on UW-OFDM, such as new papers or upcoming events such as talks on conferences.

On the signaling framework

Unique word orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is a promising alternative to cyclic prefix based OFDM (CP-OFDM), which currently denotes the method of choice for many digital communication standards, with applications ranging from audio and video broadcasting, last mile internet access to modern cellular networks. In this signaling concept, the guard interval (GI) is filled with an arbitrary deterministic sequence --- the so-called ``unique word'' (UW) --- instead of the random CP. This sequence provides the same advantages as a CP (no intersymbol interference and diagonalization of the channel matrix), but can additionally be designed to optimally meet synchronization and estimation tasks. Furthermore, most important, and different to almost all signaling schemes of the OFDM family, the UW is already part of the discrete Fourier transform (DFT) interval.

To get started with UW-OFDM visit:

• "The Potential of Unique Words in OFDM" by M. Huemer, C. Hofbauer and J. B. Huber
• Matlab example code
• Our publications

Ensuring such time domain properties entails the introduction of a certain redundancy in the frequency domain. This redundancy can be exploited beneficially to enhance range, reliability, capacity or battery lifespan. In this sense, UW-OFDM transforms the usually disregarded guard interval into a multipurpose sequence, thus tackling the well-known inefficiency problem of guard intervals in current communication systems. Moreover, adapting the UW and therefore the GI length to different channel conditions will not impact the DFT length and thus keeps relevant processing chain structures untouched. Hence, UW-OFDM allows supporting a wide range of communication scenarios while still ensuring high efficiency.