A New OFDM Synchronization Symbol for Carrier Frequency Offset Estimation

This letter proposes a new data-aided carrier frequency offset (CFO) estimation scheme for orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) communications suitable for frequency-selective channels. The proposed method is based on the transmission of a specially designed synchronization symbol that generates a particular signal structure between the received observation samples at the receiver. This structure is exploited to derive a closed-form expression of the CFO. The proposed solution offers a wide acquisition range with reduced computational load. Simulations over frequency-selective channels confirm the superiority of the proposed method compared to recent data-aided synchronization algorithms