Recently, complex orthogonal variable spreading factor (OVSF) codes based on polyphase orthogonal codes have been proposed to support multi-user/multi-rate data transmission services in synchronous direct-sequence code-division multiple access (DS-CDMA) systems. This study investigates the low signal-envelope fluctuation property of the complex OVSF codes in terms of transmission signal trajectories. In addition, a new method is proposed to suppress the envelope fluctuation more strongly at the expense of reducing the number of spreading sequences of the codes.

The direct sequence code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) technique is widely used in various communication systems. When adopting orthogonal variable spreading factor (OVSF) codes, DS-CDMA is particularly suitable for supporting multi-user/multi-rate data transmission services. A useful property of OVSF codes is that no two code sequences assigned to different users will ever interfere with each other, even if their spreading factors are different. Conventional OVSF codes are constructed based on binary orthogonal codes, called Walsh codes, and OVSF code sequences are binary sequences. In this paper, we propose new OVSF codes that are constructed based on polyphase orthogonal codes and consist of complex sequences in which each symbol is represented as a complex number. Construction of the proposed codes is based on a tree structure that is similar to conventional OVSF codes. Since the proposed codes are generalized versions of conventional OVSF codes, any conventional OVSF code can be presented as a special case of the proposed codes. Herein, we show the method used to construct the proposed OVSF codes, after which the orthogonality of the codes, including conventional OVSF codes, is investigated. Among the advantages of our proposed OVSF codes is that the spreading factor can be designed more flexibly in each layer than is possible with conventional OVSF codes. Furthermore, combination of the proposed code and a non-binary phase modulation is well suited to DS-CDMA systems where the level fluctuation of signal envelope is required to be suppressed.

3G must offer high data rates since it should support real-time multimedia services; one performance enhancement, the use of the OVSF code tree, has adopted in 3G WCDMA networks. Unfortunately, this technique allows the link capacity to be set at the base rate times powers of two. This results in wasting bandwidth while the required rate is not powers of two of the basic rate. Several multi-code assignment mechanisms have been proposed to reduce the waste rate, but incur some drawbacks, including high complexity of handling multiple codes and increasing cost of using more rake combiners. Our solution is a dynamic grouping code assignment that allows any rate to be achieved with a single code for any possible rate of traffic. The dynamic grouping approach first forms several calls into a group. It then allocates a subtree to the group and dynamically shares the subtree codes based on time-sharing of slots within a group cycle time. The waste rate and code blocking is thus reduced significantly. Since transmission delay and jitter may occur in such a time-sharing approach, two schemes of cycle interleaving are proposed to minimize delay and jitter. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed approach reduces the waste rate and increases the system utilization obviously, and the proposed cycle interleaving schemes minimizes delay and jitter significantly.

In this paper, we propose a novel peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) reduction method for multi-rate orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFCDM) based on an orthogonal variable spreading factor (OVSF) code. In the method, the base station assigns two signs of code sequence to each user to maintain the orthogonality among the code sequences that have different lengths. After that, one sign of the code sequence is selected for reducing the PAPR of the OFCDM symbol. Based on theoretical analysis and computer simulation, we show that the proposed method reduces the PAPR for two data rate classes.

In downlink MC-CDMA, orthogonal variable spreading factor (OVSF) codes can be used to allow multirate communications while maintaining the orthogonality among the users with different data rates. In this paper, we point out that simple selection of the OVSF codes results in degraded performance. We show that this happens because simple code selection results in power concentration over certain consecutive subcarriers; severe power loss in the received signal occurs when these subcarriers experience a deep fade in a frequency selective fading channel. In addition, we show two effective techniques to avoid the performance degradation: random code selection and frequency interleaving; which technique provides a better performance depends on modulation level, code multiplexing order, and presence of channel coding.