OFDM/OQAM with Hermitian Symmetry: Design and performance for baseband communication

OFDM/OQAM is a special type of multi carrier modulation that can be considered as an alternative to conventional OFDM with cyclic prefix (CP) for transmission over multi path fading channels. Indeed, as it requires no guard interval, it has the advantage of a theoretical higher spectral efficiency. In this paper, we propose a new version of OFDM/OQAM named in short HS OQAM, where HS means that an Hermitian Symmetry property is used to directly provide a modulated real valued signal. We analyze the links between HS OQAM to Wavelet OFDM (WOFDM) modulation and Wilson based modulated filter banks. The performances of HS OQAM are compared to the ones of CP OFDM for the transmission over Power Line Communication (PLC) channels.