Improving GFDM Symbol Error Rate Performance using “Better than Nyquist” Pulse Shaping Filters

Fourth generation (4G) cellular systems have been optimized to provide high data rates and reliable coverage to mobile users. New waveforms at the physical layer are needed. Generalized frequency division multiplexing (GFDM) is a candidate modulation for the fifth generation (5G) standard based on multi-branch multicarrier filter bank approach. A main characteristic of GFDM is its low out of band emission, achieved by means of a flexible time-domain pulse shaping of individual subcarriers. In this paper, the influence of the improved “Better than Nyquist” pulse shaping filters on symbol error rate (SER) performance of the GFDM system in the case of zero forcing (ZF) receiver is investigated. We considered their use in GFDM to evaluate the impact on SER performance in case of 16-QAM transmission over an additive white Gaussian noise channel. Moreover, we also considered the concept of the wavelet for better time-frequency localization of the pulse shaping filters by using the Meyer auxiliary function. Numerical results are reported to demonstrate the superior SER performance achieved.