Performance analysis of a power line communication (PLC) system with multicarrier DS-CDMA under the influence of channel effects

Abstract

Power line communication (PLC) system is evolving as a ubiquitous communication system for high speed broadband data communication. Multicarrier DS-CDMA (MC-DS-CDMA) technique is an attractive technique in achieving high data-rate transmission in wireless communication. In this thesis investigations are carried out to combine the MC-DS-CDMA technology with the features and characteristics of a PLC system. To find the effectiveness of MC-DS-CDMA system in a power line channel, a system model is proposed for high speed data communication through a power line channel using the DS-CDMA with multicarrier orthogonal FDM (OFDM) technique. Analysis is carried out by considering the combined effect of power line impulsive noise, channel transfer function, effect of load impedances and the number of branches in a PLC network without and with path diversity using rake receiver. Expressions of signal to interference and noise ratio and bit error rate (BER) at output of CDMA receiver are developed considering the above limitations. BER performance results are evaluated for different system parameters, channel parameters, processing gain, number of OFDM carriers and number of rake fingers. For a given performance level, the optimum values of system parameters like number of OFDM subcarriers, code length, number of rake fingers for a given system length, number of branches and load impedances are determined.