A timing synchronization scheme for space-time cooperative relay OFDM system

In the space-time cooperative relay orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) system, a challenge is the lack of perfect timing synchronization, which degrades the performance of the receiver greatly. This paper investigates a timing synchronization scheme to solve this problem. Unlike the conventional algorithms, our attempt primarily aims to obtain the different time delays of source and relay terminals at the destination respectively. Thus the time offset between them can be captured and a more accurate estimation of time delay of the received signals is obtained. And the simulation results illustrate the excellent performance of this scheme even at a low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in a multipath fading channel.