WiMAX physical layer: Specifications overview and performance evaluation

The WiMAX technology has drawn enormous attentions from wireless communication industry in recent years. Its sophisticated physical layer (PHY) adopts such techniques as multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) and orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), which are fundamentally different techniques from the previous 3G mobile system. To help the readers gain the knowledge of some key components of the WiMAX PHY before referring the lengthy standard documentation, we provide a brief overview of the physical layer of the WiMAX standard IEEE 802.16-2009. A simulation system with LDPC coded MIMO-OFDM is also established to evaluate the performance of the WiMAX transceiver. Simulations show that the iterative receiver structure can achieve good performance.