Joint detection of integral carrier frequency offset and preamble index in OFDMA WiMAX downlink synchronization

Initial downlink synchronization in orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA)-based WiMAX transmission involves carrier frequency synchronization, timing synchronization, and preamble index identification. Due to the structure of the preamble signal, it is reasonable to take a twostage approach in which one first estimates and compensates the timing offset and the so-called fractional carrier frequency offset (CFO) and then deals with the integral CFO and the preamble index. This paper considers joint detection of integral CFO and preamble index, under the assumption that timing and fractional CFO have been acquired to reasonable accuracy. Based on an optimization formulation, we derive a number of detection methods of different complexity and suboptimality. The methods exploit the quasi-orthogonality among the OFDMA WiMAX preamble sequences as well as the organization of the nonzero subcarriers in the preambles. Simulation results are presented to illustrate the performance of the methods.