Modeling Interference Between OFDM/OQAM and CP-OFDM: Limitations of the PSD-Based Model

TL;DR

This paper critically examines the interference modeling between OFDM/OQAM and CP-OFDM, revealing that traditional PSD-based models underestimate interference and that coexistence offers limited benefits.

Contribution

It demonstrates the limitations of PSD-based interference models and provides a more accurate analysis of interference levels between OFDM/OQAM and CP-OFDM.

Findings

PSD-based models underestimate interference levels

Actual interference from OFDM/OQAM is higher than expected

Coexistence of OFDM/OQAM with CP-OFDM offers limited spectral gains

Abstract

To answer the challenges put out by the next generation of wireless networks (5G), important research efforts have been undertaken during the last few years to find new waveforms that are better spectrally localized and less sensitive to asynchronism effects than the widely deployed Cyclic Prefix Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (CP-OFDM). One of the most studied schemes is OFDM-Offset Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (OFDM/OQAM) based on the PHYDYAS filter pulse. In the recent literature, spectrum coexistence between OFDM/OQAM and CP-OFDM is commonly studied based on the Power Spectral Density (PSD) model. In this paper, we show that this approach is flawed and we show that the actual interference injected by OFDM/OQAM systems onto CP-OFDM is much higher than what is classically expected with the PSD based model in the literature. We show that though using OFDM/OQAM in secondary systems is still advantageous, it brings limited gain in the context of coexistence with incumbent CP-OFDM systems.