Adaptive single-user receivers for direct-sequence spread-spectrum CDMA systems

The capacity of a direct-sequence spread-spectrum code-division multiple-access (DSSS-CDMA) system is limited by multiple-access interference (MAI) and the near-far problem. Multiuser receivers provide a solution to these problems, but they require knowledge of parameters of the MAI and are computationally complex. Adaptive single-user receivers, however, do not require knowledge of MAI parameters and need fewer computations. This paper discusses a wide range of adaptive single-user receivers found in the literature and presents their performance results under a unified framework to provide a basis of comparison. Results indicate that, compared to the conventional receiver, adaptive single-user receivers provide large gains in system capacity and are near-far resistant. It is shown that fractionally spaced adaptive receivers, which exploit spectral correlation due to the cyclostationary nature of the DSSS signal, perform better than adaptive receivers that cannot exploit this correlation. Multipath results presented for two-ray and urban channels indicate that fractionally spaced adaptive receivers act as RAKE receivers.