A low-complexity companding technique using Padé approximation for PAPR reduction of an OFDM system

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) systems have become the most promising wireless communication systems in the recent years. For OFDM systems, there is one major drawback, which is the high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR). Companding techniques have been frequently proposed to reduce PAPR. Exponential companding technique offers efficient PAPR reduction with a low bit error rate (BER). However, the exponential companding technique is difficult to implement. This paper utilizes the Pade approximation to simplify the exponential companding technique. The simulation results demonstrate that the proposed companding technique offers the same performance results as those of the exponential companding technique, while Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) or multipath fading channel is considered. Further, the hardware implementation results show that the complexity of the proposed companding technique is less than that of the exponential companding technique. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.