146
1, JANUARY 2007
Frequency-Offset Estimation for MIMO and OFDM
Systems Using Orthogonal Training Sequences
Kyungchun Lee and Joohwan Chun, Member, IEEE
Abstract—We propose a training-sequence-based frequency-
offset estimator for a multiple transmit-and-receive antenna sys-
tem in frequency-flat fading channels. The estimator is based
on the maximum likelihood (ML) criterion and does not require
channel information. To reduce the computational load, they
propose to use special training sequences—the periodic orthog-
onal codes. Using these codes, we get a closed form estimator
which requires much lower computational load (some additions
and multiplications). For the high signal-to-noise ratio and small
frequency offset, the proposed estimator achieves the performance
of the optimal ML estimator, which locates the peak of the
likelihood function. We also apply the proposed estimator to a
multiple antenna system in frequency-selective channels and an
orthogonal-frequency-division-multiplexing system. With theoret-
ical analysis and simulations, we evaluate the performance of the
proposed estimator.
Index Terms—Frequency offset, multiple-input multiple-output
(MIMO), multiple antennas, orthogonal frequency division multi-
plexing (OFDM).
I. I NTRODUCTION
I N DIGITAL communication, the frequency offset is induced
by the instability of oscillator, limited oscillator precision, or
the Doppler effect, resulting in the degradation of system per-
formance. Therefore, it is required to measure and compensate
for the frequency offset at the receiver.
In many algorithms to solve this problem, training sequences
(TSs) are used for simplicity of implementation with good error
performance. For single antenna systems, various data-aided
algorithms have been developed for additive white Gaussian
noise (AWGN) channels [1]–[3] or frequency-flat fading chan-
nels [4]. In [5], a maximum likelihood (ML)-based estimator is
proposed for frequency-selective channels. In [6], the estimator
in [3] is extended to frequency-selective channels and the
performance improvement is shown when the receive antenna
diversity is used. The case of transmit antenna diversity system
is considered in [7] and [8]. The estimators in [6]–[8] are
optimal solutions in receive or transmit antenna diversity, but
they do not consider the optimality in the multiple-input and
multiple-output (MIMO) antenna systems.
Manuscript received November 17, 2003; revised September 6, 2004,
May 5, 2005, August 30, 2005, and January 19, 2006. This work was supported
in part by the ADD through a grant managed by RDRC, and by KOSEF under
Contract R01-2003-000-10829-0 as well as a grant managed by MICROS ERC.
The review of this paper was coordinated by Prof. C. Xiao.
The authors are with the Division of Electrical Engineering, Department
of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Korea Advanced Institute of
Science and Technology (KAIST), Daejeon, Korea (e-mail: kclee@sclab.kaist.
ac.kr; chun@sclab.kaist.ac.kr).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TVT.2006.883805
0018-9545/$25.00 © 2007 IEEE
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO.
In this paper, we present a frequency-offset estimator for
MIMO systems. The proposed estimator utilizes the TS and
does not require channel parameters. We first derive an esti-
mator which searches for the maximum point of a likelihood
function. Then, we propose a suboptimal estimator, which
has much lower computational complexity with the constraint
that the TSs are periodic and orthogonal. We also extend the
estimator to the MIMO system in frequency-selective channels.
In addition, we apply the proposed estimator to orthogonal-
frequency-division-multiplexing (OFDM) systems. The OFDM
has the advantage that it does not require a complex equalizer in
frequency-selective channels, but it is sensitive to the frequency
offset. To estimate the frequency offset in OFDM systems,
many algorithms have been proposed previously [9]–[13]. In
[9] and [10], the cyclic prefix of OFDM signal is used for the
frequency-offset estimation. In [12] and [13], a simple data-
aided approach is proposed by making the received signal peri-
odic. Our approach is based on the estimator in [12] and [13],
and has higher accuracy by exploiting the orthogonality of
transmitted signals.
This paper is organized as follows. Section II introduces
the system model of MIMO antenna systems and derives the
frequency-offset estimator. Section III shows the theoretical
performance analysis and simulation results. In Section IV, the
presented algorithm is extended to frequency-selective channels
and OFDM systems. A summary and some final remarks con-
clude this paper in Section V.
II. F REQUENCY -O FFSET E STIMATION
A. System Model
We consider Nt transmit antennas and Nr receive antennas.
The TS of the nth transmit antenna is represented as xn =
[xn (0)xn (1) · · · xn (L − 1)], where xn (l), n = 1, 2, . . . , Nt , is
the complex baseband signal at time l, and L (> Nt ) is
the length of the TS. The power of each TS is Lσx2 (i.e.,

L−1 2 2 2
l=0 |xn (l)| = Lσx ), where σx is the average power of
transmitted symbols. Because the symbols are transmitted from
Nt transmit antennas in parallel, the Nt × L symbol matrix is
generated as follows:
 T T

X = xT T
1 x2 · · · xNt (1)
where (·)T denotes the matrix transpose. We assume that
the channel is frequency-flat fading and its time variation is
LEE AND CHUN: FREQUENCY-OFFSET ESTIMATION FOR MIMO AND OFDM SYSTEMS USING ORTHOGONAL TSs 147

negligible over L symbols. Therefore, the overall channel can where R is the L × L matrix defined by R = X† X. The
be represented as an Nr × Nt complex matrix estimator (9) has multiple maxima separated by the distance of
 h  1/Ts . Thus, it gives ambiguous estimates unless the frequency
11 ··· h1Nt offset ∆f is confined within the interval |∆f | ≤ 1/(2Ts ).
 h21 ··· h2Nt  Therefore, the acquisition range becomes
H=
 .. .. .. 
 (2)
. . . 1
hNr 1 ··· hNr Nt |∆f | ≤ (10)
2Ts
where hmn is the fading coefficient of channel from the nth The estimator (9) gives the optimal error performance, but it
transmit antenna to the mth receive antenna. When all of needs a grid search in the acquisition region. Therefore, a large
received signals have the identical frequency offset ∆f , the amount of computational effort is required for the frequency-
received signal at the mth receive antenna at time l is given by offset estimation.
Nt

ym (l) = ej2π∆f lTs hmn xn (l) + vm (l) C. Low Complexity Estimator With Periodic
n=1 and Orthogonal TSs
0 ≤ l ≤ L − 1, 1 ≤ m ≤ Nr (3) Now, we propose another ML-based frequency-offset esti-
mator with low computational complexity.
where Ts is the sampling period and vm (l) is the zero-mean
In (8), the estimate ∆fˆ is the minimum point of the log-
complex Gaussian noise with variance σv2 = E|vm (l)|2 . More
likelihood function Λ (∆f˜). If we take the derivative of Λ (∆f˜)
compactly, the overall received signals can be written in the
matrix form as with respect to ∆f˜ and set the result equal to zero at ∆fˆ,
we get
Y = HXF∆f + V (4) Nr L−1 min(L−k,L)



ˆ
where F∆f is a diagonal matrix kqm (k, l)ej2π∆f kTs = 0 (11)
m=1 k=−L+1 l=max(1,−k+1)

F∆f = diag(1, ej2π∆f Ts , . . . , ej2π∆f (L−1)Ts ) (5) where

and Y and V are the Nr × L matrices with the entries of ∗
qm (k, l) = ym (−k + L − l)r(−k+L−l+1)(L−l+1) ym (L − l)
[Y]ml = ym (l) and [V]ml = vm (l). The TSs are known at the
receiver, but the channel matrix H is unknown and should be (12)
estimated jointly with the frequency offset ∆f . 1 ≤ m ≤ N r, −L + 1 ≤ k ≤ L − 1
max(1, −k + 1) ≤ l ≤ min(L − k, L)
B. ML-Based Frequency-Offset Estimation
rmn = [R]mn (13)
We briefly review the frequency-offset-estimation algorithm
in [5]. Since the additive noise is Gaussian distributed, the log and (·)∗ means the complex conjugate.
likelihood function for H and ∆f takes the form By rearranging terms, we can rewrite (11) as
L−1 N L−k 
Λ(H̃, ∆f˜) = Y − H̃XF∆f˜2F (6)

j2π∆fˆkTs
Im kqm (k, l)e = 0. (14)
k=1 m=1 l=1
where {H̃, ∆f˜} is a trial of {H, ∆f }, and  · F denotes the
Frobenius matrix norm. For an arbitrary F∆f˜, the estimate Ĥ When the TS matrix, X is composed of identical orthogonal
which minimizes Λ(H̃, ∆f˜) is submatrices of size Nt × Nt , (14) is approximated as
L−1 N L−k 
Ĥ = Y(XF∆f˜)†

(7) jπ∆fˆLTs
Im kqm (k, l)e 0 (15)
k=1 m=1 l=1
where (·)† is the pseudoinverse. Substituting Ĥ for H̃ in (6),
we get for small normalized frequency offset (i.e., ∆f Ts ) and high
  signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). The detailed derivation of (15) is
Λ(∆f˜) = tr{YY H } − tr YFH ∆f˜
X †
XF ∆f˜Y H
. (8) given in Appendix I. From (15), we obtain the frequency-offset
estimator as follows:
Here, tr{·} and {·}H denote the operations of trace and conju- L−1 N L−k 
1

gate transpose, respectively. From (8), we obtain a frequency- ∆fˆ = − arg kqm (k, l) (16)
offset estimator πLTs m=1
k=1 l=1
 
∆fˆ = arg max tr YFH RF Y H
(9) which will be referred to as the orthogonal TS-based estimator
∆f˜ ∆f˜
∆f˜ (OTSE).
148 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007

Some remarks about the OTSE are given below. III. P ERFORMANCE A NALYSIS
1) As defined in (12), qm (k, l) is the product of ym (−k + By following Appendix II under the assumption of high
∗
L − l), r(−k+L−l+1)(L−l+1) , and ym (L − l). Because SNR, we obtain the approximated expressions for the mean and
∗
ym (−k + L − l) and ym (L − l) are the received sig- error variance of OTSE
nal values, and r(−k+L−l+1)(L−l+1) can be precomputed
from X off-line, the OTSE requires a few multiplications E(∆fˆ − ∆f ) ≈ 0 (19)
and additions. Therefore, the computational complexity
  Nr

σv2 
is significantly reduced in comparison with the estimator (Uejπ∆f LTs
E |∆fˆ − ∆f |2 ≈
in (9).
m=1
2(πLTs κ)2
2) We note that the OTSE is available only for the special 2
TSs, which are the periodic orthogonal sequences. For − UT e−jπ∆f LTs )aH 
m,∆f F (20)
the nonorthogonal TS, the approximation in (15) does
not hold, but it is generally thought that the orthogonal where U is an L × L matrix with entries
sequences are more preferable as the TS for the lower 
(n − m)rmn , if n − m > 0
error of channel and frequency-offset estimation [14]. [U]mn = (21)
0, otherwise
As an example of the practical system, orthogonal pilot
sequences are used in the space-time-transmit-diversity and am,∆f is the 1 × L vector which is defined as am,∆f =
mode in the third-generation partnership project (3GPP) hm XF∆f . The vector hm denotes the mth row of H and κ
standard [15]. In addition, orthogonal pilot sequences is as defined in Appendix II. The analytic expressions will be
are adopted in the close-loop mode 1 of the 3GPP confirmed by simulation results.
standard. For the comparison, we summarize some previously known
3) Equation (15) is equivalent to (14) for small ∆f Ts and estimators. In the case of multiple receive antennas and single
high SNR. Therefore, the OTSE, which is derived from transmit antenna in frequency-flat fading channels, the estima-
(15), can achieve the ML optimal performance only tor in [6] is
for small ∆f Ts and high SNR, but even for the low N J 
SNR or large frequency offset, its performance is still 1
r

 
2
better than other suboptimal estimators in many cases. ∆fˆ= arg E |hm1 | Φm (k) (22)
π(J + 1)Ts m=1
The detailed performance comparisons will be shown in k=1

Section III. where

4) The acquisition range of the OTSE is
L−1
1

1 Φm (k) = ym (l)x∗1 (l) (ym (l − k)x∗1 (l − k))∗ (23)

|∆f | < . (17) L−k
l=k
LTs
and J is some constant less than L. We call this estimator the
We see that the acquisition range of OTSE is comparable autocorrelation-based estimator (ABE).
with those of other suboptimal estimators in [6] and [7], In the case of multiple transmit antennas and single receive
even if it is narrower than that of (9). antenna, the estimator in [7] is
5) Since X is assumed to be a periodic and orthogonal
M
N −1 
matrix, the element of R, rl1 l2 , is nonzero only when 1
1
t

∆fˆ = arg pm ((Nt + 1)k + 1)

l2 − l1 is an integer multiple of Nt . Additionally, all M m=1 2πmTs
k=0
nonzero elements except for diagonal elements have an (24)
identical real value. Therefore, the OTSE can be sim-
plified as where pm (l) is the lth element of
  −1 H
L/Nt −1
pm = DH
m Dm Dm γm (25)
1

∆fˆ = − arg k̄Nt

πLTs  and M (< L) is a design parameter.
k̄=1
 In (25), the (L − m) × Nt2 matrix of Dm has the lth row of
Nr L−


k̄Nt  dm (m + l − 1) which is defined as (26), shown at the bottom
∗
· ym (−k̄Nt + L − l)ym (L − l) . (18) of the page. γm is the (L − m) dimensional vector whose kth

m=1 l=1 element is γm (k) = y1 (m + k − 1)y1∗ (k − 1). This estimator


dm (k) = x1 (k)x∗1 (k − m), x1 (k)x∗2 (k − m), . . . , x1 (k), x∗Nt (k − m)x2 (k), x∗1 (k − m), x2 (k)x∗2 (k − m), . . . ,

x2 (k)x∗Nt (k − m) . . . , xNt (k)x∗1 (k − m), xNt (k)x∗2 (k − m) . . . , xNt (k)x∗Nt (k − m) (26)
LEE AND CHUN: FREQUENCY-OFFSET ESTIMATION FOR MIMO AND OFDM SYSTEMS USING ORTHOGONAL TSs 149

will be referred to as the least squares estimator (LSE). Since

the LSE in [7] does not consider receive diversity, it is not easy
to compare it with the OTSE for the MIMO system. In the
following simulation results, we first compare these estimators
for the single receive antenna system, and then by averaging the
results of LSE at all receive antennas, we compare the OTSE
and LSE for MIMO systems.
When the TS consists of P identical subsequences of length
Nt , the estimator of (9) can be modified to the reduced com-
plexity form [5]
N P −1 

r

∆fˆ= max −ρm (0)+2Re ρm (l)e−j2π∆f lTs

∆f
m=1 l=0
(27)
where
L−1
1
∗
ρm (l) = ym (k)ym (k − lNt ). (28)
P Fig. 1. Performance of estimators for the SISO system. Average SNR =
k=lNt 20 dB, Nt = 1, Nr = 1, L = 8.

This estimator is called the ML estimator (MLE).

In simulations, all elements of channel matrix H are assumed
to be independent zero-mean complex-valued Gaussian random
variables with variance 1/2 per dimension (i.e., E{hmn } = 0,
E{Re(hmn )2 } = E{Im(hmn )2 } = 1/2). The average SNR is
defined as the ratio of the expected received power at each
antenna to the noise power, i.e., H2F σx2 /Nr σv2 .
We adopt the following TS
 
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
X= (29)
1 −1 1 −1 1 −1 1 −1

or its submatrix for the MLE, OTSE, and ABE. Since this
TS cannot be applied to the LSE (DH
m Dm is singular for all
possible values of m), another TS
 
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
X=
1 −1 −1 1 1 −1 −1 1
is used for the LSE as in [7].
For fair comparison of the error performance, we first con-
sider the single-input and single-output (SISO) case to which
all mentioned estimators can be applied with an identical TS,
X = [1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1]. For the ABE and LSE, we choose the
parameters of J = 7 and M = 7, which guarantee their highest
accuracy for L = 8. Fig. 1 compares the standard deviation
of errors {E[∆fˆTs − ∆f Ts ]2 }1/2 for the SISO antenna case
when the normalized frequency offset ∆f Ts varies. The aver-
age SNR is fixed to be 20 dB. It is observed that the OTSE has
slightly better performance than the LSE and ABE when ∆f Ts
is less than 0.02. We can also see the OTSE nearly achieves
the performance of MLE for small ∆f Ts , and the results from
analysis agree well with those from simulation.
The performance improvement is more apparent in the trans-
mit diversity or receive diversity system. Fig. 2 gives the
standard deviation of errors for L = 8, Nt = 2, Nr = 1, 2, and
the average SNR of 20 dB. For the LSE, we make the parameter
(30)
Fig. 2. Performance of estimators for the transmit diversity system with
L = 8. Average SNR = 20 dB, Nt = 2.
m varies from 1 to 7 as long as DH m Dm is nonsingular. There-
fore, we choose m = 1 and 3, which do not cause the matrix
singularity. For Nr = 2, we get the frequency-offset estimate
of LSE by averaging the results of two receive antennas. It is
observed that the OTSE shows better performance and nearly
achieves the performance of MLE for both single and multiple
receive antenna systems.
We also tested performances of estimators with L = 4. The
first four columns of (29) are used as TSs. Fig. 3 shows the
standard deviation of errors for L = 4, Nt = 2, Nr = 1, 2, and
the average SNR of 20 dB. Since the LSE is not applicable to
L = 4 (DH m Dm is singular for arbitrary m and TS), we tested
only MLE and OTSE. We see that MLE and OTSE have exactly
same performance for L = 4. It is known that MLE can be
expressed as a closed form when the TS is represented as two
repetitions of a subsequence [5]. For L = 2Nt , the OTSE has
150
Fig. 3. Performance of estimators for the transmit diversity system with
L = 4. Average SNR = 20 dB, Nt = 2.
Fig. 4. Error standard deviation versus average SNR. ∆f = 0, Nt = 2,
Nr = 1, L = 8.
the same form with the closed-form MLE in [5] and achieves
the optimal ML performance exactly (not approximately).
Next, the effect of SNR is simulated. Fig. 4 illustrates error
standard deviations versus average SNR when ∆f = 0, Nt =
2, Nr = 1. It shows that the estimation errors decrease and the
performance of OTSE gets closer to that of MLE as the average
SNR increases. Fig. 5 shows the error performance versus
normalized maximum Doppler frequency when the channel is
Rayleigh flat fading and ∆f = 0, Nt = 2, Nr = 1. The well-
known Jakes’ model is used for fading. We can see that the
OTSE has better performance when the maximum Doppler
frequency is less than 0.016.
For more essential comparison of performance, we test the
bit-error-rate (BER) performance of estimators when Nt = 2,
Nr = 2, and the average SNR is 20 dB. The independent
uncoded QPSK signal is transmitted from each antenna, and
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007
Fig. 5. Error standard deviation versus normalized maximum Doppler
frequency. ∆f = 0, Average SNR = 20 dB, Nt = 2, Nr = 1, L = 8.
Fig. 6. BER versus normalized frequency offset. Nt = 2, Nr = 2, L = 8.
the receiver decodes it by ML decoder using information of
∆fˆ and Ĥ. The channel estimate Ĥ is obtained from (7).
We assume the TS is followed by 32 data symbols at each
transmit antenna. Fig. 6 gives the BERs for various normalized
frequency offset when the average SNR is 5, 15, and 25 dB. As
inferred from Fig. 2, the OTSE nearly achieves the performance
of MLE. Fig. 6 also shows that the BER performance is affected
significantly by the accuracy of frequency-offset estimation.
Finally, the receive diversity system is considered for the
comparison with the ABE. We assume Nt = 1, Nr = 2, aver-
age SNR = 20 dB, and the TS is same as in the SISO case.
Fig. 7 shows that the OTSE has smaller errors in the receive
diversity system, even though it does not require the knowledge
of channel statistics.
Now, we consider the computational complexity of the pro-
posed estimator. To get the correlations of ym from m = 1
to m = Nr in (18), Nr (L − k̄Nt ) complex multiplications
and Nr (L − k̄Nt ) − 1 complex additions are necessary. For
LEE AND CHUN: FREQUENCY-OFFSET ESTIMATION FOR MIMO AND OFDM SYSTEMS USING ORTHOGONAL TSs
Fig. 7. Performance of estimators for the receive diversity system.
Average SNR = 20 dB, Nt = 1, Nr = 2, L = 8.
k̄ = 1, 2, . . . , L/Nt − 1, these operations are repeated, and the
multiplications of the real number k and a complex number
(complex-real multiplications) are added. Therefore, the overall
computational complexity becomes Nr L(L/Nt − 1)/2 com-
plex multiplications, Nr L(L/Nt − 1)/2 − 1 complex addi-
tions, and L/Nt − 1 complex-real multiplications. We assume a
complex multiplication corresponds to four real multiplications
plus two real additions, and a complex addition amounts to two
real additions. A complex-real multiplication is assumed to be
equivalent to two real multiplications. Under this assumption,
the overall operations of the proposed estimator and other
previously known estimators are summarized in Table I. The
operations of MLE in Table I refers to those of MLE#2 in [5],
2
which adopts the periodic TS. The coefficient K is the pruning
factor for the fast Fourier transform, and η is defined as η =
1 − [log2 K + 2(1/K − 1)]/ log2 (KL) [16]. Fig. 8 illustrates
the number of overall operations as a function of the length of
TS for Nt = 2, Nr = 1. The pruning factor K is fixed to be
4, and the curves of LSE are computed with M = L/2. Fig. 8
shows that the OTSE has much lower computational complexity
than the other estimators.
IV. E XTENSIONS OF THE OTSE
In this section, we apply the OTSE to the MIMO system for
frequency-selective channels and the OFDM system.
A. Application to Frequency-Selective Channels
We assume the channel memory is Γ and the channel re-
sponse between the nth transmit antenna and the mth receive
antenna is [hmn (0)hmn (1) · · · hmn (Γ − 1)]. To compensate the
multipath fading, each TS of {xn (l)} has the value from
l = −Γ + 1 to l = L − 1. The overall received signal at Nr
receive antennas becomes
Y = H̄X̄F∆f + V. (31)
151
In this equation, X̄ is the ΓNt × L matrix
 T
X̄ = XT T T
0 X1 · · · XΓ−1 (32)
where Xk is the kth shift of X
[Xk ]ml = xm (l − k − 1)
for m = 1, 2, . . . , Nt ; l = 1, . . . , L. (33)
The channel matrix, H̄ is defined as
H̄ = [H0 H1 · · · HΓ−1 ] (34)
where
[Hk ]mn = hmn (k). (35)
To apply the OTSE to frequency-selective channels, X̄
should be composed of identical ΓNt × ΓNt orthogonal ma-
trices. But, even if X is orthogonal, multipath fading generally
breaks its orthogonality resulting that X̄ is not orthogonal any
more. To maintain the orthogonality of TSs after time shifting,
we consider perfect sequences that have ideal autocorrelation,
i.e., zero sidelobes. The perfect sequence is preferable as the
TS because it yields the good channel and frequency-offset-
estimation performance [8], [14], [17]. In addition, it can be
found easily for the arbitrary length. There are various methods
for constructing a perfect sequence [18], [19]. For example, the
Zadoff–Chu sequence, which is a well-known perfect sequence,
can be obtained for the arbitrary length of Ls as
ejπk r/Ls , if Ls is even
x(k) = , k = 1, 2, . . . , Ls
ejπk(k+1)r/Ls
, if Ls is odd
(36)
where r is an integer relatively prime to Ls .
For Ls = 4, Xs = [−1 1 1 1] can also be a perfect sequence.
When this sequence is repeated three times, X̄ for Γ = 4
becomes X̄ = [1 −1 1 1 1 −1 1 1; 1 1 −1 1 1 1 −1 1;
1 1 1 −1 1 1 1 −1; −1 1 1 1 −1 1 1 1]. Since X̄ is a periodic or-
thogonal matrix, we can apply the OTSE to frequency-selective
channels with Γ = 4 and Nt = 1. If we use the Zadoff–Chu
sequence, X̄ can be obtained from Xs = [1ejπ/4 ej2π/4 ej9π/4 ].
For Nt = 2, Xs = [−1 1 1 1; 1 1 −1 1] can be a subsequence
matrix, which composes a periodic orthogonal matrix. But,
in this case, Γ is reduced to be two. When Γ has a larger
value, we should choose another subsequence. For Γ = 6 and
Nt = 1, x(k) = ej2πlk /12 with lk = {0, 1, 4, 9, 4, 1} can be
used. When Γ = 8 and Nt = 1, x(k) = ej2πlk /4 with lk =
{0, 0, 1, 2, 0, 2, 1, 0} composes a perfect sequence.
We performed simulations for frequency-selective channels,
assuming Nt = 1, 2, Nr = 2, and Γ = 4. Also, the channel
coefficients {hmn (k)} are assumed to be independent com-
plex Gaussian random variables with zero mean and vari-
ances {1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16} per dimension for k = {0, 1, 2, 3}.
152
TABLE I
COMPARISON OF COMPUTATIONAL COMPLEXITY
Fig. 8. Computational complexity versus the length of TSs.
Fig. 9. Performance comparison for frequency-selective nonfading channels.
Average SNR = 20 dB, Nr = 2, Γ = 4.
The average SNR, which is defined as H̄2F σx2 /Nr σv2 , is
assumed to be 20 dB. We utilized Xs = [−1 1 1 1] and Xs =
[1 1 j −1 1 −1 j 1; 1 −1 j 1 1 1 j −1] as the subsequence
matrices of TSs with (Nt = 1, L = 16) and (Nt = 2, L = 24),
respectively.
Fig. 9 gives the standard deviation of errors for various
frequency offsets when the channel is nonfading and indepen-
dently generated for each frame. For the ABE, the channel
statistic information is required [6], and we estimated it from
50 000 channel samples. It is observed that the OTSE has
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007
Fig. 10. Performance comparison for frequency-selective fading channels.
Average SNR = 20 dB, Nr = 2, Γ = 4.
performance comparable to that of the optimal MLE. As the
frequency offset is smaller, the performance gap decreases.
Fig. 10 shows the standard deviation of errors in frequency
selective fading channels. We see the performance of OTSE is
similar to that of the MLE and better than that of the ABE for
the entire region of normalized maximum Doppler frequency.
In addition, the OTSE has slightly better performance than the
MLE in fast fading channels.
B. Application to OFDM Systems
In OFDM systems with N point IFFT, the signal at the
receiver can be represented as
y(l) = ej2π∆f lTs s(l) + v(l), l = 0, 1, . . . , N − 1 (37)
where s(l) is the desired signal component, and v(l) is the
AWGN. The OFDM symbol duration is denoted by T = N Ts .
When Nu subcarriers of all N subcarriers are used, the desired
signal component is given as
Nu −1
1
s(l) = √ cn Hn ej2πfn lTs (38)
N n=0
where cn is the data symbol, and Hn is the channel frequency
response at the nth subcarrier. The subcarrier frequencies are
given by fn = n/T , n = 0, 1, . . . , Nu − 1. The proposed es-
timation algorithm is based on that of [13], which transmits
pseudonoise sequences on frequencies multiple of P/T and sets
LEE AND CHUN: FREQUENCY-OFFSET ESTIMATION FOR MIMO AND OFDM SYSTEMS USING ORTHOGONAL TSs 153

zeros on the others. From this, the OFDM samples of {s(l)}

have P identical parts of length K = N/P . Additionally, they
can be represented as the linear combination of the following
K periodic and orthogonal sequences:

1
xk (l) = √ ckP ej2πfkP lTs , k = 0, 1, . . . , K − 1. (39)
N

From (39), the received signal is rewritten as

K−1

y(l) = ej2π∆f lTs HkP xk (l) + v(l)

k=0

l = 0, 1, . . . , N − 1. (40)

Comparing (40) and (3), we know (40) can be regarded as a

special case of (3) with Nr = 1. Therefore, the proposed OTSE
can be applied to the OFDM system as follows: Fig. 11. Performance comparison for OFDM systems. Average SNR =
20 dB, N = 64.
N −1 N −k 
1

∆fˆ = − arg kq(k, l) (41)

πN Ts V. C ONCLUSION
k=1 l=1

We have presented a frequency-offset estimator (OTSE) for

where multiple transmit and receive antenna systems in the frequency-
flat fading channel. It is derived from the ML criterion and
q(k, l) = y(−k + N − l)r(−k+N −l+1)(N −l+1) y ∗ (N − l) requires low computational load by using the periodic and
orthogonal codes as TSs. In addition, the OTSE is applied to
(42) frequency-selective channels and OFDM systems. The perfor-
†
rmn = [X X]mn . (43) mance of the estimator has been tested by simulations. The
simulation results show that the OTSE has smaller estimation
errors than the previous suboptimal estimators and achieves
The matrix X is formed by the rows of [xk (0)xk (1) · · · xk (N − the performance of the optimal MLE for the small frequency
1)], k = 1, 2, . . . , K − 1, as in Section II. The acquisition range offset and high SNR, even if it has much smaller complexity.
of the estimator (41) is Performance improvement is more conspicuous for multiple
antenna systems.
1
|∆f | < . (44)
N Ts
A PPENDIX I
By simulation, the OTSE for OFDM systems is compared When X is composed of identical orthogonal submatrices of
with the MLE and the estimator in [13]. Fig. 11 shows the stan- size Nt × Nt , rmn (n > m) becomes
dard deviation of errors for N = 64 and P = 4, 16. We assume
the length of cyclic prefix is ten samples, and channel delay 
α, if n − m = Nt , 2Nt , . . . , L
is seven samples. The time-domain channel coefficients {hi }, rmn = (45)
I = 0, 1, . . . , 6, are independent complex Gaussian random 0, otherwise
variables with zero mean and variance {1/2i+1 } per dimension.

N −1 2 2
The average SNR, which is defined as l=0 |s(l)| /N σv , where α is a constant value. Substituting (45) into (14) yields
is 20 dB.
In Fig. 11, the OTSE nearly achieves the performance of 
MLE and outperforms the estimator in [13], when ∆f Ts is less 
 L/Nt −1 Nr L−k̄Nt

than 0.4. This is because the OTSE uses the orthogonality of Im αk̄Nt ym (−k̄Nt + L − l)
sequences in addition to the periodicity while the estimator in 
 k̄=1 m=1 l=1
[13] only employs the periodicity. The OTSE has the narrow
acquisition range compared to the MLE and has worse perfor- 


mance for large frequency offsets than the estimator in [13], but ∗ ˆ
· ym (L − l)ej2π∆f k̄Nt Ts = 0. (46)
after initial system settling, the frequency offset is generally a 

small value less than 1/N Ts .
154 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007

From (3), we get (47), shown at the bottom of the page. Since For small ∆fˆTs , we can see that the left-hand side of (50) is
X is the periodic and orthogonal matrix, the first term of (47) approximately zero when (49) holds because
becomes  
cos π(∆fˆ − ∆f )(L − 2k̄Nt )Ts

Nr L−

k̄Nt Nt

 
e−j2π∆f k̄Nt Ts hmn1 xn1 (−k̄Nt + L − l)  cos π∆f (L − 2k̄Nt )Ts  1 (51)
m=1 l=1 n1 =1 ˆ ˆ
N ∗ ej2π∆f k̄Nt Ts  ejπ∆f LTs  1. (52)

t

· hmn2 xn2 (L−l) = (L− k̄Nt )σx2 H2F e−j2π∆f k̄Nt Ts .
n2 =1
(48)
Assuming L/Nt is odd, we substitute (47) and (48) into (46)
to obtain (49), shown at the bottom of the page. In the similar
manner, we can rewrite (15) as (50), shown at the bottom of
the page.
Therefore, if we assume ∆f Ts  1 and SNR  1, the ML
estimate ∆fˆ becomes small, and we can say that (14) and (15)
are equivalent for orthogonal and periodic TSs. In addition,
even if ∆f Ts increases, the desired signal part of (50), whose
power is proportional to cos{π∆f (L − 2k̄Nt )Ts }, decreases
slowly because of the property of cos(·). Thus, we can use
the OTSE for some large frequency offsets although its perfor-
mance is a little inferior to that of MLE. When L/Nt is even,
we can also prove (15) in the similar manner.

Nr L−


k̄Nt
∗
ym (−k̄Nt + L − l)ym (L − l)
m=1 l=1
Nr L− k̄Nt
Nt
∗ Nt


−j2π∆f k̄Nt Ts
= e hmn2 xn2 (L − l) hmn1 xn1 (−k̄Nt + L − l) + vm (−k̄Nt + L − l)
m=1 l=1 n2 =1 n1 =1
Nt
∗ Nt


× ej2π∆f (L−l)Ts hmn2 xn2 (L − l) + ej2π∆f (−k̄Nt+L−l)Ts ∗

hmn1 xn1 (−k̄Nt +L−l) vm (L−l)
n2 =1 n1 =1
!
∗
+ vm (−k̄Nt + L − l)vm (L − l) (47)

(L/N t−1)/2  L/Nt −1

ˆ

ˆ
Im 2αk̄Nt (L − k̄Nt )σx2 H2F · cos π(∆fˆ − ∆f )(L − 2k̄Nt )Ts ejπ(∆f −∆f )LTs + ej2π∆f k̄Nt Ts
k̄=1 k̄=1
Nr L− k̄Nt
Nt
∗ Nt


× vm (−k̄Nt +L−l)· ej2π∆f (L−l)Ts hmn2 xn2(L−l) + ej2π∆f (−k̄Nt +L−l)Ts hmn1 xn1 (−k̄Nt +L−l)
m=1 l=1 n2 =1 n1 =1
!
∗ ∗
· vm (L − l) + vm (−k̄Nt + L − l)vm (L − l) =0 (49)

(L/N t−1)/2  L/Nt −1

jπ(∆fˆ−∆f )LTs ˆ
Im 2αk̄Nt (L − k̄Nt )σx2 H2F · cos π∆f (L − 2k̄Nt )Ts e + ejπ∆f LTs
k̄=1 k̄=1
Nr L− k̄Nt
Nt
∗ Nt


× vm (−k̄Nt +L−l) · ej2π∆f (L−l)Ts hmn2 xn2 (L−l) + ej2π∆f (−k̄Nt +L−l)Ts hmn1 xn1 (−k̄Nt +L−l)
m=1 l=1 n2 =1 n1 =1
!
∗ ∗
· vm (L − l) + vm (−k̄Nt + L − l)vm (L − l) 0 (50)
LEE AND CHUN: FREQUENCY-OFFSET ESTIMATION FOR MIMO AND OFDM SYSTEMS USING ORTHOGONAL TSs 155

A PPENDIX II Since we assume the noise power is small enough, the

inner part of arg{·} in (59) has small imaginary value, and its
The inner part of (16) can be represented as the matrix form
real value is approximately 1. Therefore, the frequency-offset-
L−1

Nr L−k

estimation error can be approximated as
kqm (k, l)
k=1 m=1 l=1 1
∆fˆ − ∆f ≈ − {Im(ν) cos(π∆f LTs )
Nr
πLTs κ

H
= ym Uym + Re(ν) sin(π∆f LTs )} . (60)
m=1
Nr

 From the definition of ν, we have
= hm XF∆f UFH H H H H H
∆f X hm + vm UF∆f X hm
m=1 Nr

   
+ H
hm XF∆f Uvm + H
vm vm (53) Re(ν) = Re(vm )(U + UT )Re aT
m,∆f
m=1

where ym and vm are the mth row of Y and V, respectively.  

+ Im(vm )(U + UT )Im aT
m,∆f (61)
If the noise level is low enough, we can neglect the last term
H Nr
vm v m of (53) and simplify it as
  
Im(ν) = Im(vm )(U − UT )Re aT
m,∆f
L−1

Nr L−k

m=1
kqm (k, l) ≈ κe−jπ∆f LTs + ν (54) 
k=1 m=1 l=1 − Re(vm )(U − UT )Im(aT
m,∆f ) . (62)
where
Substituting (61) and (62) into (60), we obtain

(L/N −1)/2

 ασx2 H2F k̄=1 t 2k̄Nt (L− k̄Nt )

   1

 · cos π∆f(L−2k̄Nt )Ts ,


if L/Nt is odd ∆fˆ−∆f ≈ −
πLTs κ

(L/N −2)/2
κ = ασx2 H2F t
2k̄Nt (L− k̄Nt ) (55)

 k̄=1
 Nr

   

  

 · cos π∆f (L − 2k̄Nt )Ts +(L/2)2 · Im(vm ) (U−UT )Re aT
m,∆f cos(π∆f LTs )

 m=1
if L/Nt is even   
Nr + (U+UT )Im aT m,∆f sin(π∆f LTs )

ν= vm UFH H H H
∆f X hm +hm XF∆f Uvm . (56)   
+ Re(vm ) −(U−UT )Im aT m,∆f cos(π∆f LTs )
m=1
  
To compute the estimation error variance, we rewrite (54) as + (U+UT )Re aTm,∆f sin(π∆f LTs ) .
L−1

Nr L−k

 ν  (63)
kqm (k, l) ≈ κe−jπ∆f LTs 1 + .
κe−jπ∆f LTs
k=1 m=1 l=1
(57) Since all elements of Re(vm ) and Im(vm ) have independent
Gaussian distribution of N (0, σv2 /2), the mean and variance of
From (57), we get the frequency-offset-estimation error
frequency estimation errors become
1  ν 
∆fˆ − ∆f ≈ − arg 1 + −jπ∆f LT . (58)
πLTs κe s E(∆fˆ−∆f ) ≈ 0 (64)

By separating the real and imaginary part of ν (= Re(ν) +  

Nr
σv2
jIm(ν)), the frequency-offset error has the form E |∆fˆ−∆f |2 ≈
m=1
2(πLTs κ)2
 "
1 Re(ν) + jIm(ν) #  
∆fˆ−∆f ≈ − arg 1 + × (U − UT )Re aT
πLTs κe−jπ∆f LTs m,∆f cos(π∆f LTs )

1 1# 
+ (U + UT )Im aT
 2

=− arg 1+ Re(ν) cos(π∆f LTs ) m,∆f sin(π∆f LTs ) F
πLTs κ   
− Im(ν) sin(π∆f LTs ) + −(U−UT )Im aT m,∆f cos(π∆f LTs )
  2 $
+ j {Im(ν) cos(π∆f LTs ) + (U+UT )Re aT sin(π∆f LTs ) .
m,∆f F
$"
+ Re(ν) sin(π∆f LTs )} . (65)

(59) Rearranging terms in (65) yields (20).

156 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VEHICULAR TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 56, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007
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Kyungchun Lee received the B.S. and M.S. degrees
in electrical engineering from Korea Advanced Insti-
tute of Science and Technology (KAIST), Daejeon,
Korea, where he is currently working toward the
Ph.D. degree.
His research interests include signal processing
for wireless communications with focus on detec-
tion and estimation for multiinput and multioutput
systems.
Joohwan Chun (S’82–M’94) received the Ph.D.
degree from Stanford University, Stanford, CA,
in 1989.
During 1989 and 1992, he was a member of the
technical staff at General Electric, Schenectady, NY.
Since 1992, he has been a faculty member with
the Electrical Engineering Department at the Korea
Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
(KAIST), Daejeon, Korea. He was a Visiting As-
sociate Professor at Stanford University, Stanford,
CA, in 1998–1999. His fields of interest include
estimation theory and multiple-antenna wireless communications.