A symbol timing synchronization method for OFDM systems using an estimated time delay spread

In this paper, proposed is a symbol timing synchronization method for OFDM systems. Firstly, the proposed method temporarily detects a symbol timing based on a peak value of the correlation function of training signals at the head of a burst signal. Then, the proposed method modifies the symbol timing based on a time delay spread which is estimated both from upper and lower bounds of correlation function having high correlation around the temporarily detected symbol timing. From simulation results, BER (Bit Error Rate) of the proposed method can be improved by about 1.5~2.5 times than that of a conventional method under the 18-ray Rayleigh fading model with maximum Doppler frequency of 30Hz.