Enhanced QPSK or DQPSK data demodulation for direct sequence spreading (DSS) system waveforms using orthogonal or near-orthogonal spreading sequences

1. In a receiver, a method of correcting phase error of a phase shift keyed (PSK) signal, comprising the steps of:

(a) receiving a signal modulated by a spreading sequence;

(b) despreading the received signal using a receiver spreading sequence similar to the spreading sequence of step (a);

(c) calculating a crosscorrelation profile between the receiver spreading sequence and the received signal;

(d) calculating an autocorrelation profile of the receiver spreading sequence to determine a spreading code property (SCP);

(e) estimating a timing error in alignment between the autocorrelation and the crosscorrelation profiles; and

(f) correcting a phase error of the signal despread in step (c), by using the SCP and the estimated timing error.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the received signal includes pulses at a chip rate, and

step (a) includes:

demodulating the received signal with a carrier signal to form a baseband signal,

sampling the baseband signal at a rate greater than the chip rate, and

step (b) includes:

despreading the baseband signal at a rate that is the same as the chip rate.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein

demodulating includes forming inphase (I) and quadrature (Q) baseband signals, and

despreading includes despreading the I and Q baseband signals using only one receiver spreading sequence.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the received signal includes pulses at a chip rate, and

between step (a) and step (b) the following steps are performed:

phase rotating the received signal to form serially demodulated I and Q baseband signals, each sampled at a rate greater than the chip rate,

reducing the sampled I and Q baseband signals by at least a factor of ½ to form decimated I and Q baseband signals, each sampled at the chip rate, and

despreading the decimated I and Q baseband signals using the receiver spreading sequence at the chip rate.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein

despreading the decimated I and Q baseband signals is performed using a single receiver spreading sequence.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein

step (a) includes demodulating the received signal to form I and Q baseband signals, and

step (c) includes separately crosscorrelating the I and Q baseband signals with a sequence of chips of the receiver spreading sequence to form an I correlated signal and a Q correlated signal.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein

the I and Q correlated signals are summed to form the crosscorrelation profile.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein

prior to summing, the I and Q correlated signals are individually squared.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein

step (d) includes time shifting the receiver spreading sequence against the same receiver spreading sequence by a maximum time of two chip periods of the receiver spreading sequence.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein

the time shifting is a maximum time of one chip period.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein

the received signal includes data symbols, each symbol including an integer number of chips, and

step (d) includes determining the SCP for at least one symbol.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein for 8 chips per symbol, the SCP for a data symbol takes on values of −7, −5, −3, −1, 1, 3, 5 or 7.

13. The method of claim 1 wherein

step (e) includes the steps of:

locating a peak value of the crosscorrelation profile as COR (nTc), where Tc is a chip period and n is a sample number;

determining a value of a sample of the crosscorrelation profile after the peak value, as COR ([n+1]Tc) and a value of another sample of the crosscorrelation profile before the peak value, as COR ([n−1]Tc); and

using the values of COR (nTc), COR ([n−1]Tc) and COR ([n+1]Tc) to estimate the timing error.

14. The method of claim 1 wherein

an estimated timing error, estimated in step (e), and the SCP, determined in step (d), are used to select a phase error stored in a look-up-table (LUT), and

step (f) uses the selected phase error to correct the phase error of the signal despread in step (c).

15. The method of claim 1 wherein

step (f) includes using values of degrees, or values of sine/cosine terms, stored in a look-up-table (LUT) to correct the phase error of the signal despread in step (c).

16. The method of claim 1 wherein

step (b) includes despreading the received signal into a despread I and Q baseband signals, and

step (f) includes correcting the phase error of the despread I and Q baseband signals using values of sine and cosine terms stored in a look-up-table (LUT) to form phase corrected I and Q symbols for quadrature PSK (QPSK) detection.

17. The method of claim 1 wherein

the received signal includes one of QPSK, differential QPSK, QBL-MSK, 8-PSK, differential 8-PSK, π/4-QPSK, differential π/4-QPSK, BPSK, or differential BPSK.

18. A receiver comprising

a despreading module for despreading a baseband signal, using a spreading sequence generated by a code generator,

a crosscorrelation module for calculating a crosscorrelation profile between the baseband signal and the spreading sequence,

an autocorrelation module for calculating an autocorrelation profile of the spreading sequence to determine a SCP value of the spreading sequence,

an error timing estimating module, coupled to the crosscorrelation and autocorrelation modules, for estimating an alignment error between the autocorrelation profile and the crosscorrelation profile, and

a phase correction module, coupled to the error timing estimating module and the despreading module, for correcting a phase error in the despread baseband signal; wherein the phase correction module is configured to extract phase error correction values from a look-up-table (LUT),

the LUT including the phase error correction values based on SCP values and alignment errors between the autocorrelation and crosscorrelation profiles.

19. The receiver of claim 18 including

a demodulator for mixing a carrier signal with a received signal, including a chipping rate of pulses, to form a demodulated signal,

an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) configured to sample the demodulated signal, at a sampling rate greater than the chipping rate, to form a sampled signal,

a phase rotator for phase rotating the sampled signal to form a serially demodulated signal at the same sampling rate, and

a decimator for reducing the sampling rate of the serially demodulated signal to form the baseband signal.

20. The receiver of claim 19 wherein the baseband signal includes a baseband I signal and a baseband Q signal, and

the same spreading sequence is used to despread the baseband I and Q signals.

21. The receiver of claim 18 wherein

the phase correction module includes multipliers for multiplying the despread baseband signal with sine and cosine values extracted from the (LUT).

22. The receiver of claim 18 wherein the baseband signal is one of QPSK, differential QPSK, QBL-MSK, 8-PSK, differential 8-PSK, π4-QPSK, or differential π/4-QPSK.