Estimation of synchronization parameters

Sammanfattning: This thesis deals with the estimation of synchronization parameters in {Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing} (OFDM) communication systems and in active ultrasonic measuring systems. Estimation methods for the timing and frequency offset and for the attenuation taps of the frequency selective channel are presented and investigated.In OFDM communication systems the estimation of the timing offset of the transmitted data frame is one important parameter. This offset provides the receiver with a means of synchronizing its sampling clock to that of the transmitter. A second important parameter is the offset in the carrier frequency used by the receiver to demodulate the received signal.For OFDM systems using a cyclic prefix, the joint {Maximum Likelihood} (ML) estimation of the timing and carrier frequency offset is introduced. The redundancy introduced by the prefix is exploited optimally. This novel method is derived for a non-dispersive channel. Its performance, however, is also evaluated for a frequency-selective Rayleigh-fading radio channel. Time dispersion causes an irreducible error floor in this estimator's performance. This error floor is the limiting factor for the applicability of the timing estimator. Depending on the requirements, it may be used in either an acquisition or a tracking mode. For the frequency estimator the error floor is low enough to allow for stable frequency tracking.A low-complex variant of the timing offset estimator is presented allowing a simple implementation. This is the ML estimator, given a 2-bit representation of the received signal as the sufficient statistics. Its performance is evaluated for a frequency-selective Rayleigh-fading radio channel and for a twisted-pair copper channel. Simulations show this estimator to have a similar error floor as the full resolution ML estimator.The problem of estimating the propagation time of a signal is also of interest in active pulse echo systems, such as are used in, {\it e.g.}, radar, medical imaging, and geophysics. The {Minimum Mean Squared Error} (MMSE) estimator of arrival time is derived and investigated for an active airborne ultrasound measurement system. Besides performing better than the conventional {\it Maximum a Posteriori} (MAP) estimator, this method can be used to develop different estimators in situations where the system Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) is unknown.Coherent multi-amplitude OFDM receivers generally need to compensate for a frequency selective channel in order to detect transmitted data symbols reliably. For this purpose, a channel equalizer needs to be fed estimates of the subchannel attenuations.The linear MMSE estimator of these attenuations is presented. Of all linear estimators, this estimator optimally makes use of the frequency correlation between the subchannel attenuations. Low-complex modified estimators are proposed and investigated. The proposed modifications cause an irreducible error floor for this estimator's performance, but simulations show that for SNR values up to 20~dB, the improvement of a modified estimator compared to the Least Squares (LS) estimator is at least 3~dB.