arXiv subjects

Ananthanarayanan Chockalingam

Publications and source records attributed to Ananthanarayanan Chockalingam.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Multiuser Zak-OTFS on the Uplink with Superimposed Spread-Pilots

In this paper, we consider the uplink of a multiuser Zak-OTFS system comprising users with heterogeneous delay-Doppler (DD) periods/frame sizes. Multiple access is achieved through time-frequency (TF) shifts that place the users in non-overlapping regions of the TF plane. Closed-form expressions for the effective DD domain channel between each user and the base station are derived for sinc and Gaussian pulse shaping filters. The inter-user interference (IUI) is shown to be negligible under the TF-shift-based multiple access, thereby decoupling the multiuser input-output relation (IOR) estimation problem into independent single-user estimation problems. For IOR estimation, a superimposed spread-pilot framework is employed. The spread-pilot sequence is obtained by applying FFT to a reshaped Zadoff-Chu sequence. To mitigate the pilot-data interference introduced by the superimposed spread-pilot, a DD dictionary-based IOR estimation scheme that iterates between IOR estimation and data detection is employed. Simulation results for a multiuser Zak-OTFS system demonstrate that the resulting IOR estimates achieve normalized mean-square error (NMSE) and bit error rate (BER) performances that closely match those of the corresponding single-user system. Furthermore, for sinc pulse shaping, the superimposed spread-pilot frame achieves higher spectral-efficiency compared to embedded pilot frame across a wide range of inter-user power ratios. For Gaussian pulse shaping, however, the embedded pilot frame achieves a higher spectral efficiency due to the combined effects of residual IUI and significant pilot-data interference in the case of superimposed spread-pilot. The robustness of the estimation framework to variations in channel power-delay profile and maximum Doppler shift is also demonstrated.

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arXiv2026

On the Effect of Pulse Shaping Filters in Zak-OTFS Waveform for Radar Sensing

In radar sensing, the self-ambiguity function of the probing waveform plays a crucial role in the resolvability and detection of multiple targets. In the recent Zak-OTFS based radar literature, Gaussian pulse shaping filter has been considered, and it has been shown to offer better range/velocity estimation performance compared to the traditional chirp waveform in scenes with multiple targets. While the self-ambiguity function with Gaussian filter has very low side lobes, its main lobe is wide which compromises resolvability and performance. Motivated by this, we seek filters with better ambiguity characteristics. Specifically, we explore two other known filters, namely, sinc and Gaussian-sinc (GS) filters, and demonstrate that these filters offer better performance compared to Gaussian filter under different scenarios and receiver processing. Towards demonstrating this, we derive closed-form expressions for the self-ambiguity functions of Zak-OTFS waveform with sinc and GS filters. The ambiguity functions of sinc and GS filtered waveforms have narrow main lobes, resulting in better resolvability in scenes with densely populated targets for the basic peak-detection based receiver. The ambiguity function of Gaussian filtered waveform has very low sidelobes, resulting in better performance in sparsely populated scenes. When a receiver with inter-target interference mitigation is used, the sinc and GS filters perform better in both dense and sparsely populated scenes compared to Gaussian filter.

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arXiv2026

Does 6G Need a New Waveform: Comparing Zak-OTFS with CP-OFDM

Across the world, there is growing interest in new waveforms, Zak-OTFS in particular, and over-the-air implementations are starting to appear. The choice between OFDM and Zak-OTFS is not so much a choice between waveforms as it is an architectural choice between preventing inter-carrier interference (ICI) and embracing ICI. In OFDM, once the Input-Output (I/O) relation is known, equalization is relatively simple, at least when there is no ICI. However, in the presence of ICI the I/O relation is non-predictable and its acquisition is non-trivial. In contrast, equalization is more involved in Zak-OTFS due to inter-symbol-interference (ISI), however the I/O relation is predictable and its acquisition is simple. {Zak-OTFS exhibits superior performance in doubly-spread 6G use cases with high delay/Doppler channel spreads (i.e., high mobility and/or large cells), but architectural choice is governed by the typical use case, today and in the future. What is typical depends to some degree on geography, since large delay spread is a characteristic of large cells which are the rule rather than the exception in many important wireless markets.} This paper provides a comprehensive performance comparison of cyclic prefix OFDM (CP-OFDM) and Zak-OTFS across the full range of 6G propagation environments. The performance results provide insights into the fundamental architectural choice.

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arXiv2025

A Reinforcement Learning Framework for Resource Allocation in Uplink Carrier Aggregation in the Presence of Self Interference

Carrier aggregation (CA) is a technique that allows mobile networks to combine multiple carriers to increase user data rate. On the uplink, for power constrained users, this translates to the need for an efficient resource allocation scheme, where each user distributes its available power among its assigned uplink carriers. Choosing a good set of carriers and allocating appropriate power on the carriers is important. If the carrier allocation on the uplink is such that a harmonic of a user's uplink carrier falls on the downlink frequency of that user, it leads to a self coupling-induced sensitivity degradation of that user's downlink receiver. In this paper, we model the uplink carrier aggregation problem as an optimal resource allocation problem with the associated constraints of non-linearities induced self interference (SI). This involves optimization over a discrete variable (which carriers need to be turned on) and a continuous variable (what power needs to be allocated on the selected carriers) in dynamic environments, a problem which is hard to solve using traditional methods owing to the mixed nature of the optimization variables and the additional need to consider the SI constraint. We adopt a reinforcement learning (RL) framework involving a compound-action actor-critic (CA2C) algorithm for the uplink carrier aggregation problem. We propose a novel reward function that is critical for enabling the proposed CA2C algorithm to efficiently handle SI. The CA2C algorithm along with the proposed reward function learns to assign and activate suitable carriers in an online fashion. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed RL based scheme is able to achieve higher sum throughputs compared to naive schemes. The results also demonstrate that the proposed reward function allows the CA2C algorithm to adapt the optimization both in the presence and absence of SI.

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arXiv2025

MIMO-Zak-OTFS with Superimposed Spread Pilots

In this paper, we consider the problem of spread pilot design and effective channel estimation in multiple-input multiple-output Zak-OTFS (MIMO-Zak-OTFS) with superimposed spread pilots, where data and spread pilot signals are superimposed in the same frame. To achieve good estimation performance in a MIMO setting, the spread pilots at different transmit antennas need to be effectively separated at the receiver. Towards this, we propose a spread pilot design that separates the pilot sequences in the cross-ambiguity domain and enables the estimation of the effective channel taps by a simple read-off operation. To further alleviate the effect of pilot-data interference on performance, we carry out turbo iterations between channel estimation and detection. Simulation results for $2\times 2$ and $3\times 3$ MIMO-Zak-OTFS with Gaussian-sinc pulse shaping filter for vehicular-A channel model show that the proposed pilot design and estimation scheme with three turbo iterations can achieve very good estimation/detection performance.

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arXiv2025

Delay-Doppler Pulse Shaping in Zak-OTFS Using Hermite Basis Functions

The performance of Zak-OTFS modulation is critically dependent on the choice of the delay-Doppler (DD) domain pulse shaping filter. The design of pulses for $L^2(\mathbb{R})$ is constrained by the Balian-Low Theorem, which imposes an inescapable trade-off between time-frequency localization and orthogonality for spectrally efficient systems. In Zak-OTFS, this trade-off requires balancing the need for localization for input/output (I/O) relation estimation with the need for orthogonality for reliable data detection when operating without time or bandwidth expansion. The well-known sinc and Gaussian pulse shapes represent the canonical extremes of this trade-off, while composite constructions such as the Gaussian-sinc (GS) pulse shape offer a good compromise. In this work, we propose a systematic DD pulse design framework for Zak-OTFS that expresses the pulse as a linear combination of Hermite basis functions. We obtain the optimal coefficients for the Hermite basis functions that minimize the inter-symbol interference (ISI) energy at the DD sampling points by solving a constrained optimization problem via singular value decomposition. For the proposed class of Hermite pulses, we derive closed-form expressions for the I/O relation and noise covariance in Zak-OTFS. Simulation results of Zak-OTFS with embedded pilot and model-free I/O relation estimation in Vehicular-A channels with fractional DDs demonstrate that the optimized pulse shape achieves a bit error rate performance that is significantly superior compared to those of the canonical sinc and Gaussian pulses and is on par with that of the state-of-the-art GS pulse, validating the proposed framework which provides greater design flexibility in terms of control of ISI and sidelobe energies.

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arXiv2025

Zak-OTFS over CP-OFDM

Zak-Orthogonal Time Frequency Space (Zak-OTFS) modulation has been shown to achieve significantly better performance compared to the standardized Cyclic-Prefix Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (CP-OFDM), in high delay/Doppler spread scenarios envisaged in next generation communication systems. Zak-OTFS carriers are quasi-periodic pulses in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain, characterized by two parameters, (i) the pulse period along the delay axis (``delay period") (Doppler period is related to the delay period), and (ii) the pulse shaping filter. An important practical challenge is enabling support for Zak-OTFS modulation in existing CP-OFDM based modems. In this paper we show that Zak-OTFS modulation with pulse shaping constrained to sinc filtering (filter bandwidth equal to the communication bandwidth $B$) followed by time-windowing with a rectangular window of duration $(T + T_{cp})$ ($T$ is the symbol duration and $T_{cp}$ is the CP duration), can be implemented as a low-complexity precoder over standard CP-OFDM. We also show that the Zak-OTFS de-modulator with matched filtering constrained to sinc filtering (filter bandwidth $B$) followed by rectangular time windowing over duration $T$ can be implemented as a low-complexity post-processing of the CP-OFDM de-modulator output. This proposed ``Zak-OTFS over CP-OFDM" architecture enables us to harness the benefits of Zak-OTFS in existing network infrastructure. We also show that the proposed Zak-OTFS over CP-OFDM is a family of modulations, with CP-OFDM being a special case when the delay period takes its minimum possible value equal to the inverse bandwidth, i.e., Zak-OTFS over CP-OFDM with minimum delay period.

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arXiv2025

Zak-OTFS based Multiuser Uplink in Doubly-Spread Channels

Wireless users with different characteristics will be expected to share spectrum in next generation communication networks. One of the great strengths of wireless networks based on Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is the ease with which different non-overlapping time-frequency (TF) resources can be allocated to different users by simply shifting each user's signal in time and frequency. However, a significant weaknesses of OFDM is the inflexibility of sub-carrier spacing. Since OFDM does not allow users to have different sub-carrier spacing, a single user subject to inter-carrier interference causes carrier spacing to increase for all users. Zak-OTFS is an alternative delay-Doppler (DD) domain modulation scheme, where, in contrast to OFDM, the Input-Output (I/O) relation is predictable. We match the strength of OFDM by designing a novel DD domain method of shaping the transmitted Zak-OTFS pulse on the uplink that enables flexible non-overlapping TF resource allocation. The base station (BS) receives a superposition of uplink signals and applies individual matched filters to obtain the data specific to individual users. We develop theoretical measures of interference between users, and present numerical simulations for a vehicular channel model representative of next generation propagation environments. We demonstrate single-user performance in a multiuser Zak-OTFS uplink system without needing to provision guard bands between TF resources allocated to different users. These performance results demonstrate that the benefits of a predictable Zak-OTFS waveform can be realized within an architecture for uplink communication.

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arXiv2025

Precoded Zak-OTFS for Per-Carrier Equalization

In Zak-OTFS (orthogonal time frequency space) modulation the carrier waveform is a pulse in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain, formally a quasi-periodic localized function with specific periods along delay and Doppler. When the channel delay spread is less than the delay period, and the channel Doppler spread is less than the Doppler period, the response to a single Zak-OTFS carrier provides an image of the scattering environment and can be used to predict the effective channel at all other carriers. The image of the scattering environment changes slowly, making it possible to employ precoding at the transmitter. Precoding techniques were developed more than thirty years ago for wireline modem channels (V.34 standard) defined by linear convolution where a pulse in the time domain (TD) is used to probe the one-dimensional partial response channel. The action of a doubly spread channel on Zak-OTFS modulation determines a two-dimensional partial response channel defined by twisted convolution, and we develop a novel precoding technique for this channel. The proposed precoder leads to separate equalization of each DD carrier which has significantly lower complexity than joint equalization of all carriers. Further, the effective precoded channel results in non-interfering DD carriers which significantly reduces the overhead of guard carriers separating data and pilot carriers, which improves the spectral efficiency significantly.

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arXiv2025

Zak-OTFS to Integrate Sensing the I/O Relation and Data Communication

The Zak-OTFS input/output (I/O) relation is predictable and non-fading when the delay and Doppler periods are greater than the effective channel delay and Doppler spreads, a condition which we refer to as the crystallization condition. The filter taps can simply be read off from the response to a single Zak-OTFS point (impulse) pulsone waveform, and the I/O relation can be reconstructed for a sampled system that operates under finite duration and bandwidth constraints. Predictability opens up the possibility of a model-free mode of operation. The time-domain realization of a Zak-OTFS point pulsone is a pulse train modulated by a tone, hence the name, pulsone. The Peak-to-Average Power Ratio (PAPR) of a pulsone is about $15$ dB, and we describe a general method for constructing a spread pulsone for which the time-domain realization has a PAPR of about 6dB. We construct the spread pulsone by applying a type of discrete spreading filter to a Zak-OTFS point pulsone. The self-ambiguity function of the point pulsone is supported on the period lattice $Λ_{p}$, and by applying a discrete chirp filter, we obtain a spread pulsone with a self-ambiguity function that is supported on a rotated lattice ${Λ^*}$. We show that if the channel satisfies the crystallization conditions with respect to ${Λ^*}$ then the effective DD domain filter taps can simply be read off from the cross-ambiguity between the channel response to the spread pulsone and the transmitted spread pulsone. If, in addition, the channel satisfies the crystallization conditions with respect to the period lattice $Λ_{p}$, then in an OTFS frame consisting of a spread pilot pulsone and point data pulsones, after cancelling the received signal corresponding to the spread pulsone, we can recover the channel response to any data pulsone.

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arXiv2025

Waveform for Next Generation Communication Systems: Comparing Zak-OTFS with OFDM

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arXiv2025

Closed-Form Expressions for I/O Relation in Zak-OTFS with Different Delay-Doppler Filters

The transceiver operations in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain in Zak-OTFS modulation, including DD domain filtering at the transmitter and receiver, involve twisted convolution operation. The twisted convolution operations give rise to multiple integrals in the end-to-end DD domain input-output (I/O) relation. The I/O relation plays a crucial role in performance evaluation and algorithm development for transceiver implementation. In this paper, we derive discrete DD domain closed-form expressions for the I/O relation and noise covariance in Zak-OTFS. We derive these expressions for sinc and Gaussian pulse shaping DD filters at the transmitter (Tx). On the receiver (Rx) side, three types of DD filters are considered, viz., $(i)$ Rx filter identical to Tx filter (referred to as `identical filtering'), $(ii)$ Rx filter matched to the Tx filter (referred to as `matched filtering'), and $(iii)$ Rx filter matched to both Tx filter and channel response (referred to as `channel matched filtering'). For all the above cases, except for the case of sinc identical filtering, we derive exact I/O relation and noise covariance expressions in closed-form. For the sinc identical filtering case, we derive approximate closed-form expressions which are shown to be accurate. Using the derived closed-form expressions, we evaluate the bit error performance of Zak-OTFS for different Tx/Rx filter configurations. Our results using Vehicular-A (Veh-A) channel model with fractional DDs show that, while matched filtering achieves slightly better or almost same performance as identical filtering, channel matched filtering achieves the best performance among the three.

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arXiv2025

Zak-OTFS for Identification of Linear Time-Varying Systems

Linear time-varying (LTV) systems model radar scenes where each reflector/target applies a delay, Doppler shift and complex amplitude scaling to a transmitted waveform. The receiver processes the received signal using the transmitted signal as a reference. The self-ambiguity function of the transmitted signal captures the cross-correlation of delay and Doppler shifts of the transmitted waveform. It acts as a blur that limits resolution, at the receiver, of the delay and Doppler shifts of targets in close proximity. This paper considers resolution of multiple targets and compares performance of traditional chirp waveforms with the Zak-OTFS waveform. The self-ambiguity function of a chirp is a line in the delay-Doppler domain, whereas the self-ambiguity function of the Zak-OTFS waveform is a lattice. The advantage of lattices over lines is better localization, and we show lattices provide superior noise-free estimation of the range and velocity of multiple targets. When the delay spread of the radar scene is less than the delay period of the Zak-OTFS modulation, and the Doppler spread is less than the Doppler period, we describe how to localize targets by calculating cross-ambiguities in the delay-Doppler domain. We show that the signal processing complexity of our approach is superior to the traditional approach of computing cross-ambiguities in the continuous time / frequency domain.

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arXiv2025

A Gaussian-Sinc Pulse Shaping Filter for Zak-OTFS

The choice of delay-Doppler domain (DD) pulse shaping filter plays an important role in determining the performance of Zak-OTFS. Sinc filter has good main lobe characteristics (with nulls at information grid points) which is good for equalization/detection, but has high side lobes which are detrimental for input-output (I/O) relation estimation. Whereas, Gaussian filter is highly localized with very low side lobes which is good for I/O relation estimation, but has poor main lobe characteristics which is not good for equalization/detection. In this paper, we propose a new filter, termed as {\em Gaussian-sinc (GS) filter}, which inherits the complementary strengths of both Gaussian and sinc filters. The proposed filter does not incur time or bandwidth expansion. We derive closed-form expressions for the I/O relation and noise covariance of Zak-OTFS with the proposed GS filter. We evaluate the Zak-OTFS performance for different pulse shaping filters with I/O relation estimated using exclusive and embedded pilots. Our results show that the proposed GS filter achieves better bit error rate (BER) performance compared to other filters reported in the literature. For example, with model-free I/O relation estimation using embedded pilot and 8-QAM, the proposed GS filter achieves an SNR gain of about 4 dB at $10^{-2}$ uncoded BER compared to Gaussian and sinc filters, and the SNR gain becomes more than 6 dB at a coded BER of $10^{-4}$ with rate-1/2 coding.

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arXiv2024

Zak-OTFS with Interleaved Pilots to Extend the Region of Predictable Operation

When the delay period of the Zak-OTFS carrier is greater than the delay spread of the channel, and the Doppler period of the carrier is greater than the Doppler spread of the channel, the effective channel filter taps can simply be read off from the response to a single pilot carrier waveform. The input-output (I/O) relation can then be reconstructed for a sampled system that operates under finite duration and bandwidth constraints. We introduce a framework for pilot design in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain which makes it possible to support users with very different delay-Doppler characteristics when it is not possible to choose a single delay and Doppler period to support all users. The method is to interleave single pilots in the DD domain, and to choose the pilot spacing so that the I/O relation can be reconstructed by solving a small linear system of equations.

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arXiv2024

Zak-OTFS and Turbo Signal Processing for Joint Sensing and Communication

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arXiv2024

Zak-OTFS: Pulse Shaping and the Tradeoff between Time/Bandwidth Expansion and Predictability

The Zak-OTFS input/output (I/O) relation is predictable and non-fading when the delay and Doppler periods are greater than the effective channel delay and Doppler spreads, a condition which we refer to as the crystallization condition. When the crystallization condition is satisfied, we describe how to integrate sensing and communication within a single Zak-OTFS subframe by transmitting a pilot in the center of the subframe and surrounding the pilot with a pilot region and guard band to mitigate interference between data symbols and pilot. At the receiver we first read off the effective channel taps within the pilot region, and then use the estimated channel taps to recover the data from the symbols received outside the pilot region. We introduce a framework for filter design in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain where the symplectic Fourier transform connects aliasing in the DD domain (predictability of the I/O relation) with time/bandwidth expansion. The choice of pulse shaping filter determines the fraction of pilot energy that lies outside the pilot region and the degradation in BER performance that results from the interference to data symbols. We demonstrate that Gaussian filters in the DD domain provide significant improvements in BER performance over the sinc and root raised cosine filters considered in previous work. We also demonstrate that, by limiting DD domain aliasing, Gaussian filters extend the region where the crystallization condition is satisfied. The Gaussian filters considered in this paper are a particular case of factorizable pulse shaping filters in the DD domain, and this family of filters may be of independent interest.

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arXiv2023

OTFS -- Predictability in the Delay-Doppler Domain and its Value to Communication and Radar Sensing

In our first paper [2] we explained why the Zak-OTFS input-output (I/O) relation is predictable and non-fading when the delay and Doppler periods are greater than the effective channel delay and Doppler spreads, a condition which we refer to as the crystallization condition. We argued that a communication system should operate within the crystalline regime. It is well known that it is possible to identify a linear time varying (LTV) channel if and only if it is under-spread. The crystallization condition is more restrictive than the under-spread condition, so identification is always possible. In the crystalline regime, we show that Zak-OTFS pilot sequences minimize the complexity of identifying the effective DD domain channel filter. We demonstrate that the filter taps can simply be read off from the response to a single Zak-OTFS pilot. In general, we provide an explicit formula for reconstructing the Zak-OTFS I/O relation from a finite number of received pilot symbols in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain. This reconstruction formula makes it possible to study predictability of the Zak-OTFS I/O relation for a sampled system that operates under finite duration and bandwidth constraints. We analyze reconstruction accuracy for different choices of the delay and Doppler periods, and of the pulse shaping filter. Reconstruction accuracy is high when the crystallization condition is satisfied, implying that it is possible to learn directly the I/O relation without needing to estimate the underlying channel. This opens up the possibility of a model-free mode of operation, which is especially useful when a traditional model-dependent mode of operation (reliant on estimation of the underlying physical channel) is out of reach (for example, when the channel comprises of unresolvable paths, or exhibits a continuous delay-Doppler profile such as in presence of acceleration). Our study clarifies the

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