Cyclic block FMT modulation for broadband power line communications

Abstract

A novel multi-carrier modulation scheme for broadband power line communication (PLC) is presented. The novel architecture is based on the Filtered Multitone (FMT) modulation concept. However, the novel modulation scheme uses the circular convolution instead of the linear convolution in the filtering operations. We refer to this new architecture as Cyclic Block Filtered Multitone Modulation (CB-FMT). CB-FMT can benefit from the high sub-channel frequency confinement and the design of an orthogonal prototype pulse is simplified w.r.t. conventional FMT. A simple frequency domain equalizer can be deployed in frequency selective channels. Furthermore, CB-FMT can offer high frequency notching capability which is an important requirement in PLC to fulfill EMC norms. Numerical results show that CB-FMT has higher achievable rate than OFDM for the same number of data sub-channels.