Peak-to-Average Power Ratio Reduction for Acoustic Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing Systems

Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is an appealing modulation scheme for high-rate underwater acoustic communications that are challenged by multipath propagation. However, it has a drawback in the large peak-to-average power ratio (PAR). Techniques for PAR reduction have been extensively studied for radio communication systems. Although these techniques are applicable to acoustic systems, we take a different approach that aims to capitalize on the fundamental differences between the acoustic and the radio systems; namely, the fact that acoustic transmissions are inherently band limited. We extend the tone reservation technique to the out-of-band carriers and design efficient methods for constructing OFDM signals with lower PAR. Two approaches are investigated, one based on a gradient algorithm and another that uses random sequences. Simulation results show that our techniques can provide PAR reduction without the loss in data rate.