SPACE-TIME CODED SOQPSK IN THE PRESENCE OF DIFFERENTIAL DELAYS

Abstract

This paper presents a method of detecting the Tier I modulation SOQPSK when it is used in a space-time coded (STC) system in which there is a non-negligible differential delay between the received signals. Space-time codes are useful to eliminate data dropouts which occur on aeronautical telemetry channels in which transmit diversity is employed. The proposed detection algorithm employs a trellis to detect the data while accounting for the offset between the in-phase and quadrature-phase components of the signals as well as the differential delay. The performance of the system is simulated and presented and it is shown that the STC eliminates the BER floor which results from the data dropouts.