OFDM–IDMA for Uplink Transmission in Passive Optical Networks

In this paper, we propose the orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing-interleaved division multiplexing access (OFDM-IDMA) technique for passive optical networks (PONs). We evaluate the performance of such systems and compare it with the already proposed OFDM-Access (OFDMA) technique by means of the bit error rate versus received power for two different coding schemes and different number of iterations. Results show that OFDM-IDMA technique with an unequal power allocation distribution among the different optical network units (ONUs) offers similar performance to OFDMA when used with a simple convolutional code at an aggregated rate of 4 and 8 Gbits/s. Dynamic bandwidth allocation can be easily implemented with this technique.