Performance analysis of frequency domain im schemes under CFO and IQ imbalance

Next generation of mobile networks is the key area of research with increasing demand for new applications and use cases. In order to satisfy the applications with high data rate, high reliability, and low latency, multicarrier transmission through index modulation (IM) has been considered as a promising candidate owing to its flexible structures. In general, existing IM schemes are only evaluated for ideal communication scenarios. In this work, error performance of three frequency domain IM schemes are investigated and compared in the presence of carrier frequency offset (CFO) and in-phase/quadrature (IQ) imbalance. Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing with IM (OFDM-IM), OFDM with generalized IM (OFDM-GIM), and OFDM with subcarrier number modulation (OFDM-SNM) are assessed. It is shown via computer based simulations that although OFDM-GIM and OFDM-SNM provide higher spectral efficiency compared with OFDM-IM, they are more sensitive against RF impairments. Among them, OFDM-IM provides the best error performance under CFO and IQ imbalance.