30
1, JANUARY 2001
Cyclic Spectral Analysis of Continuous-Phase
Modulated Signals
Antonio Napolitano, Member, IEEE, and Chad M. Spooner, Member, IEEE
Abstract—Continuous-phase modulated (CPM) signals play a
prominent role in modern communication systems due to their
desirable constant-modulus property and the ability to control
their power and bandwidth efficiencies. Popular CPM signals
include the classical minimum-shift keyed (MSK) signal, the
LREC family of signals also known as continuous-phase fre-
quency-shift-keyed (CPFSK) signals, and Gaussian MSK, which
is used in state-of-the-art GSM and PCS mobile communication
systems. CPM signals, like virtually all man-made communication
signals, are known to exhibit cyclostationarity, which implies that
their probabilistic parameters, such as mean, second moment, and
higher order cumulants, are almost-periodic functions of time. In
this paper, a novel representation of CPM signals as a sum of PAM
signals is presented for both integer and noninteger modulation
index cases. Then, the th-order cyclostationarity properties of
binary CPM signals are derived in terms of th-order temporal
and spectral moment and cumulant functions. Moreover, the
case of -ary CPM signals is briefly addressed. The results are
illustrated with simulations involving MSK, REC, and GMSK
signals.
Index Terms—Continuous-phase modulated signals, cyclosta-
tionarity, higher order statistics.
I. INTRODUCTION
C ONTINUOUS-PHASE modulated (CPM) signals are
used in modern satellite and mobile communications due
to their excellent power and bandwidth efficiency and their
constant-modulus property [2], [3], [29], [34]. Examples of
CPM signals include minimum-shift keyed (MSK) signals,
Gaussian MSK (GMSK) signals used in GSM and DECT
mobile communication systems, and CPFSK signals (which
are also known as REC CPM signals).
In the recent past, a variety of new signal processing methods
for CPM signals have been developed by exploiting the fact
that CPM signals can be closely approximated by the sum of
several pulse-amplitude modulated (PAM) signals [23], [27].
This opens up the possibility of applying the signal processing
tools and methods associated with linear modulation. In partic-
ular, the PAM approximation to CPM, which is often called the
Laurent representation (LR) after [23], is used in [6], [7], and
[28] to perform carrier synchronization and in [20] to propose
Manuscript received June 23, 1999; revised September 6, 2000. This work
was supported in part by the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR), Italy.
The associate editor coordinating the review of this paper and approving it for
publication was Prof. Bjorn Ottersten.
A. Napolitano is with the Dipartimento di Ingegneria Elettronica e delle
Telecomunicazioni, Università di Napoli Federico II, Napoli, Italy (e-mail:
antnapol@unina.it).
C. M. Spooner is with the Mission Research Corporation, Monterey, CA
93940-5776 USA (e-mail: cmspooner@mrcmry.com).
Publisher Item Identifier S 1053-587X(01)00077-0.
1053–587X/00$10.00 © 2001 IEEE
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO.
a new kind of CPM modulator. Reduced-complexity LR-based
Viterbi-algorithm demodulators are derived in [1], [5], [6], and
[21]. Work on related topics has also begun to appear. For ex-
ample, in [9], the LR is used to extend linear-modulation blind-
equalization techniques to GMSK.
The LR is not the only linear approximation to CPM signals.
A parallel line of inquiry has been developed around the notion
of approximating a CPM signal with a single staggered quater-
nary phase-shift keyed (SQPSK) signal. This idea is based on
the observation that MSK is exactly represented as a CPM signal
(the 1REC CPFSK signal with modulation index of )
and as a SQPSK signal with half-cosine pulse functions. The
approximation itself is considered in [25], in which the SQPSK
pulse function is sought that minimizes the mean-square error
between the CPM signal and the SQPSK signal. Finally, in [4]
and [8], the SQPSK representation is used to develop reduced-
complexity Viterbi algorithms for demodulation of GMSK sig-
nals.
In this paper, the Laurent representation of a binary CPM
signal with noninteger modulation index in terms of PAM sig-
nals is revised. Specifically, with reference to CPM signals with
finite-length phase-response functions, a general procedure is
described to construct both pulses and modulating sequences of
the constituent PAM signals. Such a procedure, unlike the one
of [23], provides an expression for the pulse of each PAM signal
in terms of a set of nonoverlapping elementary pulses. A further
procedure is used to obtain a PAM-signal expansion for the case
of an integer modulation index. The proposed PAM expansions,
with respect to the representations and/or approximations pro-
posed in [4], [8], and [25], possess the advantage of being more
general since all values of the modulation index and all kinds of
phase-response function are accommodated.
CPM signals, like virtually all man-made communication sig-
nals, exhibit cyclostationarity. Thus, for sufficiently high order
, the th-order moment or cumulant is an almost-periodic
function of time.
Exploitation of cyclostationarity has become an active area
of research in the past ten years [12], [13] in the design of ele-
ments of cooperative communication systems, such as synchro-
nizers and blind equalizers, and in the design of elements of
noncooperative communication systems (signal interceptors),
such as weak-signal detectors, direction finders, signal separa-
tors, and automatic modulation classifiers. Successful exploita-
tion of cyclostationarity typically requires knowledge of a cycle
frequency or more detailed knowledge about a set of th-order
moments or cumulants of the signal. Cycle frequencies are the
Fourier frequencies resulting from the Fourier-series representa-
tion of the almost-periodic moment or cumulant function [12],
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 31

[17], [32] and are typically simple linear functions of funda- is referred to as the phase response of the system. The pulse am-
mental modulation parameters such as keying rates and carrier plitude is normalized so that , where is referred
frequencies. to as the modulation index.
Examples of exploitation of second-order cyclostation-
arity for detection and modulation classification are given in A. PAM Expansion for Noninteger Modulation Index
[14]–[16], and [22], in which knowledge of cycle frequencies For , the CPM signal can be represented
is used to compute decision statistics. More recently, higher as
order cyclostationarity [17], [30], [32] has been applied to the
modulation classification problem [24], [26], [33]. The various
proposed algorithms require, in one way or another, detailed
knowledge of the higher order moments and cumulants of the
(3)
cyclostationary signals of interest.
Moreover, for noninteger values of the modulation index , it
Since CPM signals are assuming an increasing prominence
can be easily shown that
in modern communication systems and high-performance
signal processing algorithms of various sorts benefit from de- (4)
tailed knowledge about communication signals’ time-varying
moments and cumulants, we present, in this paper, a derivation where
of the th-order cumulants of binary CPM signals. Such a
problem was addressed in [10] and [11], where it was limited to (5)
the fourth-order case and with reference to full-response CPM
signals. Moreover, second-order cyclic spectra of some CPM
signals were derived in [18], [35], and [36]. The analysis made (6)
in the present paper is based on an expansion of binary CPM
signals in terms of PAM signals, which is a revised version of and hence
that presented in [23] and facilitates the subsequent computa-
tion of the desired probabilistic parameters. Both integer and
noninteger modulation index cases are considered. Moreover,
starting from a result presented in [27], the case of -ary CPM
signals is briefly addressed. The results are illustrated using
CPFSK, MSK, and GMSK; signals and simulations are used to
corroborate the theoretical analysis.
The paper is organized as follows. The derivation of the PAM
signal representation of CPM signals is sketched in Section II.
The representation is used in Section III to derive the th-order T

cumulant functions for CPM. The case of -ary CPM signals

is briefly treated in Section IV. Examples, including corrobo-
rating simulations, are provided in Section V, and conclusions (7)
are drawn in Section VI.
where
T with ;
II. BINARY CPM SIGNAL EXPANSION IN TERMS OF PAM T;
SIGNALS
convolution operation;
Let us consider the complex-valued (baseband) CPM signal Dirac’s delta function.
Therefore, by substituting (7) into (3) and accounting for the
identity

rect (8)
(1)
where
where is a sequence of binary independent identically
rect (9)
distributed (i.i.d.) equiprobable symbols assuming values , otherwise
is the bit rate, is a finite-length pulse nonzero only for
, and it follows that the CPM signal (1) can be written as

(10)
(2)
32 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

where Moreover, for integer values of , it results that

T
(11)

and even
(21)
rect (12) odd
where is an undetermined constant that can assume values
That is, the CPM signal can be expressed as sum of PAM . Therefore, the CPM signal (1) can be written as
signals with baud rate , base pulses with width , and
statistically dependent modulating sequences . (22)
Representation (10) can be reduced to the sum of only
PAM signals. For this purpose, it is shown in Appendix A that
all vectors can be grouped into classes , where
each constituted by the elements , and it T
even
results that T (23)
odd
and
(13)
rect (24)
where
Finally, let us note that in the case of integer modulation index
(14) the sum of PAM signals cannot be simplified to a sum of
signals, as in the case of noninteger modulation index.
with
III. HIGHER ORDER CYCLOSTATIONARITY PROPERTIES OF
T
(15) CPM SIGNALS

and
(16)
Note that the procedure to reduce the number of PAM signals
from to is different from that (not completely speci-
fied) in [23] and leads to PAM signals whose pulses (16) are
expressed, unlike in [23], in terms of the nonoverlapping pulses
. said to exhibit joint th-order wide-sense cyclostationarity with
B. PAM Expansion for Integer Modulation Index
Since the complex exponential function is easily expressed in
terms of elementary trigonometric functions
(17)
In this section, higher order cyclic parameters [17] are de-
rived for a CPM signal, starting from its representation as sum
of PAM signals. Moreover, the gross higher order cyclostation-
arity properties of the signal are discussed.
A. Background on Higher Order Cyclostationarity
In the fraction-of-time (FOT) probability framework, con-
tinuous-time complex-valued time-series are
cycle frequency , for a given conjugation configura-
tion, if the th-order cyclic temporal cross-moment function
(CTCMF)
(25)

where exists and is not zero for some [17]. In (25), T

and T are column vectors, and su-

(18)
perscript represents optional conjugation of the time-series
(19) . The -fold Fourier transform of the CTCMF,
which is called the th-order cyclic spectral cross-moment
then one can show that function (CSCMF), can be written as [17]
T
(26)

where T T T , and T.
T The function , which is referred to as the th-order re-
duced-dimension CSCMF (RD-CSCMF), can be expressed as
the -fold Fourier transform of the th-order reduced-di-
(20) mension CTCMF defined by setting into (25).
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 33

Let us now consider the th-order cyclic temporal cross- and

cumulant function (CTCCF), that is, the coefficient
T

(32)
cum
(27) where are the Fourier transforms of the real-valued pulses
of the Fourier-series expansion of the th-order temporal defined in (16), and and are
cross-cumulant function [17]. Its -fold Fourier transform is the th-order RD-CSCMF and th-order CCP, respectively,
the th-order cyclic spectral cross-cumulant function , of the discrete-time-series defined
which can be written as [17] according to (15). The RD-CSCMF is the
T -fold discrete Fourier transform of the reduced-dimen-
(28)
sion cyclic temporal cross moment function (see Appendix B)
where the th-order cyclic cross-polyspectrum (CCP)
is the -fold Fourier transform of the reduced-dimension
CTCCF obtained by setting into (27).
The CCP is the preferred spectral characterization of higher
order cyclostationarity because it, unlike the RD-CSCMF, is a
well-behaved function for time-series models of interest under
the mild assumption that samples of the time-series are asymp-
totically statistically independent as their separation increases T
without bound.

B. Cyclic Parameters for Noninteger Modulation Index

For noninteger values of the modulation index , from
(13)–(16), it follows that the complex CPM signal (1) can be
expressed as sum of statistically dependent PAM signals, T
say .
Accounting for (B.3) and (15), it immediately follows that the otherwise
almost-periodic component of each modulating sequence of the (33)
PAM signals is zero. Therefore, from (13), it also results that where
the almost-periodic component of the CPM signal (1) is zero.
That is, the expected value (in the FOT probability sense [12])
of the signal (1) is zero. (In conventional terms, the CPM signal
contains no finite-strength additive sine-wave components, such
as a dc component.)
The th-order reduced-dimension cyclic spectral moment
T
function (RD-CSMF) and the th-order cyclic polyspectrum (34)
(CP) of the CPM signal, accounting for (13), are given by
In (33) and (34), T,
T, ,
(29)
T, ,
and , and denotes the almost-pe-
riodic component extraction operation for discrete-time-series
(30) [12]. Moreover, denotes an optional minus sign to be
considered only when the optional conjugation is present
respectively, where T . In (29) and and is defined in (A.2). The CCP
(30), and are the th-order can be evaluated as the -fold discrete Fourier transform
RD-CSCMF and the th-order CCP, respectively, of the of the reduced-dimension cyclic temporal cumulant function
time-series . They can be expressed as
[30]

T
P

(31) T (35)
34 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

where and pulse [or, equivalently, modulating sequence

Kronecker’s delta function; and pulse ] is given by
set of distinct partitions of , each consti-
tuted by the subsets ;
number of elements in ; T
-dimensional vector whose components are the
time-series with ; (40)
and the second summation ranges over all vectors
T
T such that and
. In (35) otherwise

where T, , , and
are defined according to (14)–(16), and
(36)
T
(41)

can be evaluated according to (33).

From (29), (31), and (33), it follows that the CPM signal can Note that the sequence is an ordered signal [31] since
exhibit th-order cyclostationarity for the considered conjuga- its statistics are expressed in terms of the ordered values of the
tion configuration only if T
is an integer. lags . Thus, the Fourier transform can be
Let us note that the RD-CSMF of the discrete-time-series evaluated by following the guidelines given in [31].
For , the right-hand member of (40) is the RD-CSMF of
the CPM signal (1). Moreover, often for , this RD-CSMF
(37) turns out to be a good approximation of the RD-CSMF of the
CPM signal since the PAM signal has a power much
(which is the modulating sequence of a PAM signal that often is greater than the power of the other PAM signals in expansion
sufficient by itself to closely approximate the CPM signal) can (13). Therefore, the higher order cyclostationarity properties
be evaluated by (see Appendix B) of CPM signals can be determined from (40) rigorously for
and with good approximation for . From (40), it
T
follows that when is an even integer, the PAM signal
T exhibits th-order cyclostationarity for the considered
conjugation configuration at cycle frequencies that are multi-
(38) T
ples of the bit rate . On the other hand, when is an
T odd integer, the cycle frequencies are odd multiples of half the
bit rate.
otherwise Practical detectors for CPM signals can be realized when the
modulation index is a rational number, say, ,
where , mod denotes the modulo operation, with and as relatively prime integers [34]. In such
and a case, there always exist orders and conjugation configura-
T
T
tions such that is an odd integer. In fact, if is odd,
then one can choose and the conjugation configuration such
T
T that . If is even, say, , with
odd, then one can choose and the conjugation configuration
T T
(39) such that . Analogously, an order and a con-
T
jugation configuration can be found such that is an even
In (39), are the entries of the vector integer.
ordered such that and The second-order cyclic statistics of the CPM signal can be
T. determined by specializing relationships (29)–(32) to .
Moreover, with regard to the modulation sequence , from
From (38), it follows that for the considered conjugation
(38) with , one has
configuration, the discrete-time modulating sequence
T
is th-order wide-sense stationary when is an even
integer, is th-order wide-sense cyclostationary with period T
T
2 when is an odd integer, and has zero th-order
temporal moment function otherwise. (42)
Denoting by the -fold discrete Fourier trans- T
form of , from (31) and (38), it follows that the
RD-CSMF of the PAM signal with modulating sequence otherwise
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 35

from which the cyclic autocorrelation function and the conju- for . Hence, from (48) and (49), it follows that
gate cyclic autocorrelation function follow immediately since,
for , it results that
(51)
(43)

Furthermore, let us note that in the special case , the

modulating sequence is second-order white since from where are the PAM signals appearing in (49). In
(42) and (43), it results that (51), the CCP’s can be expressed as [30]

T
or
(44)

or (52)

C. Cyclic Parameters for Integer Modulation Index where is the Fourier transform of the real-valued pulse
The th-order RD-CSMF of a CPM signal with integer mod- defined in (24), and is the th-order CCP
ulation index can be derived starting from (22), from which it of the discrete-time-series defined ac-
immediately follows that cording to (23). The CCP is the -fold
(45) discrete Fourier transform of the RD-CTCCF
that can be evaluated by a formula analogous to (35), where the
cyclic temporal cross moment functions of the discrete-time-se-
From (23) and accounting for (B.3), it follows that ries are determined according to
even
(46)
odd

where . Therefore, for integer values of , from

(22), it results that
T
even

even
odd
T
(47)
where T, denotes the almost-periodic
component extraction operation for continuous time-series, and,
in derivation of (47) for odd, the fact that is periodic
and, hence, deterministic in the FOT probability sense has been
accounted for. T
From (47), it follows that CPM signals with integer modula-
tion index contain first-order periodicities whose period is for
odd.
even and for odd. Therefore, (22) can be rewritten as
(53)
(48)
Note that in (53) and for even, and
where and for odd.
In the special case , is a PAM signal with modu-
(49) lating sequence
even
(54)
odd
and it results that
and pulse
cum

cum (50) rect (55)

36 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

Therefore, it can be easily shown that is practically coincident with the complex envelope of the real
T band-pass CPM signal
even
T T (62)
odd, even
T T
provided that the carrier frequency is sufficiently greater than
the (theoretically infinite but practically finite) bandwidth of the
odd, odd signal (1) as it happens in all real situations. In such a case, the
(56) higher order cyclic spectra and the corresponding supports in the
space of , its analytic signal, and its in-phase and
and
T quadrature components can be related to those of the complex
even envelope (1) by exploiting the relationships derived in [19].
odd
(57) IV. -ARY CPM SIGNALS
In this section, the higher order cyclostationarity properties
where and are the th-order cyclic temporal of -ary CPM signals are briefly addressed.
moment function and the th-order cumulant, respectively, of Let us consider the -ary CPM signal (with even)
the sequence . In derivation of (57) for odd, the fact that
for i.i.d. sequences with even first-order probability (63)
distribution function has been used. Moreover, from (51), (52),
(56), and (57), it follows that we have (58), shown at the bottom
where is a sequence of -ary i.i.d. symbols assuming
of the page, and
values in , and is the pulse de-
fined in (2).
T
It is shown in [27] that the CPM signal (63) can be expressed
even as the product
odd
(64)
(59)

where where is such that , and

T (65)
(60)

and where are binary CPM signals with

T T
(61) modulation indices , with denoting the modula-
tion index of the -ary CPM signal (63). In (65),
are binary sequences of i.i.d. symbols,
In (60), is the Fourier transform of the real pulse assuming values in and such that
given by (55).
Since the symbols are i.i.d., and, hence, (66)
are nonzero only for mod 1. Then,
is nonzero for when and Accounting for the relationship [32]
are both odd integers. Therefore, since is identi-
cally zero for odd, it follows that are impure
cycle frequencies (see [17]) for the CPM signal.
Finally, let us note that in both cases of integer and nonin- (67)
teger modulation index, the complex base-band CPM signal (1)

T
even

T
odd, even (58)

T
odd, odd
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 37

where and denotes a joint continuous where for even and for odd, is the
-fold (in ) and discrete (in ) convolution, from (64), periodic function
it follows that the RD-CSMF of the -ary CPM signal can be
written as rect

(73)
with for even and for odd, and
(68) is the real PAM signal

In (68), the RD-CSMFs can be expressed by (45) or rect

(29) if the modulation index is an integer or not, respec- (74)

tively. Note that an expression in terms of CPs analogous to
with stationary modulating sequence for even and
(68) does not hold. If, however, at least one of the RD-CSMFs
cyclostationary modulating sequence for
is coincident with the corresponding CP, then all the
odd. Then, the cyclic parameters of the CPM signal (72) can be
possible impulses present in the other RD-CSMFs are spread by exactly obtained by specializing results (54)–(61) to the case
the convolutions in , and hence, does not contain where is given by (69) and .
impulses, that is, it is coincident with the corresponding cyclic
polyspectrum. B. 2REC Signal
For the 2REC signal, and
V. EXAMPLES
In this section, some examples of binary CPM signals are rect (75)
considered, and their higher order cyclostationarity properties For noninteger values of the modulation index , the two PAM
are analyzed. signals in (13) can be obtained observing that and
, is constituted by T, T,
A. 1REC Signal
and T and contains the only vector T.
For the 1REC (also referred to as CPFSK) signal, and
Therefore, accounting for (5), (6), (12), and (16), after straight-
rect (69) forward calculus, one obtains

Therefore, for noninteger values of the modulation index , ac-

counting for (13)–(16), this signal is equivalent to a single PAM
signal with modulating sequence rect

(70) rect

and pulse rect

rect (76)
and
rect
(71)
or, equivalently, modulating sequence and rect
pulse . In the special case , one obtains
the expressions for the modulating sequence and the pulse of a (77)
PAM signal equivalent to the MSK signal. Furthermore, from (15) one has
From the above, it follows that the cyclostationarity proper-
ties of the 1REC signal with noninteger modulation index can (78)
be exactly determined by considering those of the PAM signal
with modulating sequence and pulse . That is, (40) and
provides the exact expression for the RD-CSMF of the 1REC
signal with noninteger . (79)
For integer values of the modulation index , from (22)–(24)
and (46)–(49), it follows that the CPFSK signal can be expressed In order to compare the CPM signal with the PAM signal
as with modulating sequence and pulse , simu-
lation experiments have been carried out by discretizing both
(72) time and frequency with sampling increments and ,
38 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

Fig. 1. Real parts of the 2REC signal with T = 8T and h = 0:5 (solid line) Fig. 3. Magnitude of the conjugate second-order cyclic spectrum estimates at
and of its approximating PAM signal s (t) (dotted line).  = 1=2T of the 2REC signal with T = 8T and h = 0:5 (thin line) and of
its approximating PAM signal s (t) (thick line).

Fig. 2. Power spectral density function estimates of the 2REC signal with T =
8 T and h = 0:5 (thin line) and of its approximating PAM signal s (t) (thick Fig. 4. Magnitude of the second-order cyclic spectrum estimates at  = 1=T
line). of the 2REC signal with T = 8T and h = 0:5 (thin line) and of its
approximating PAM signal s (t) (thick line).

respectively, where is the number of samples. Furthermore,

here and in the following, the second-order (cyclic) spectra
have been evaluated by the frequency-smoothed (cyclic)
periodogram method using samples and a spectral
frequency resolution . Moreover, the fourth-order
cyclic polyspectra have been evaluated by the time-smoothed
cyclic periodogram method with canceled -submanifold
[32] using samples, a spectral frequency resolution
, and a block overlap factor .
In Fig. 1, the behavior of the real parts of the 2REC signal
with and and of the corresponding
PAM signal have been reported. The match between the
two waveforms is evident and is confirmed by the comparison
of their power spectral densities (see Fig. 2). From the Fig. 5. Magnitude of the slice for f = 1=2T and f = 0 of the fourth-order
analysis carried out in Section III-B, it follows that the 2REC cyclic polyspectrum P (f ; f ; f ) estimates at  = 1=T of the 2REC
signal with T = 8T and h = 0:5 (thin line) and of its approximating PAM
signal with can exhibit second-order cyclostationarity signal s (t) (thick line).
T
with both conjugation configurations ( ) and
T
( ). Moreover, from the discussion following
(41), one has that the PAM signal exhibit second-order 1) the conjugate cyclic spectrum at (see
cyclostationarity at cycle frequency and Fig. 3);
for the conjugation configurations and , respectively, 2) the cyclic spectrum at (see Fig. 4);
and fourth-order cyclostationarity at cycle frequency 3) the slice of the fourth-order cyclic
for the conjugation configuration . Thus, in order to polyspectrum at (see Fig. 5).
compare the cyclostationarity exhibited by and , From these plots, it follows that the two signals exhibit practi-
three cases have been considered: cally indistinguishable cyclostationarity features.
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 39

(a) (b)

(c) (d)
Fig. 6. Power spectral density function estimates of the 2REC signal with T = 8T (thick line) compared with that of the secondary PAM signal s (t) (thin
line) for (a) h = 0:2, (b) h = 0:4, (c) h = 0:6 and (d) h = 0:8.

Finally, an experiment has been carried out to study the close- concentrated in the interval . Therefore, a GMSK
ness of the approximation of the 2REC signal by the only one signal with pulse turns out to be practically equivalent
PAM signal for various values of the modulation index to a CPM signal with finite-width pulse
. By considering the power spectral density (PSD) of the dif-
ference signal [that is, the PSD of the rect (82)
secondary PAM ], it results that the PAM signal turns
out to be a good approximation to the 2REC signal for a wide
Such a CPM signal is, in turn, equivalent to the sum of two PAM
range of values of the modulation index ( ), whereas it is
signals whose pulses, accounting for (5), (6), (12), and (16), are
not sufficient to closely approximate the CPM signal for values
given by
of close to unity (see Fig. 6).

C. GMSK Signal rect

The GMSK signal is a CPM signal (1) with infinite-width
pulse given by rect

rect
rect (83)
erfc erfc (80) and
rect (84)
where , (typically ), and
erfc is the complementary error function defined by
and whose modulating sequences are given by (78) and (79),
respectively, specialized for :
erfc (81)
(85)
From an (amplitude scaled) plot of as a function of
(see Fig. 7), it is evident that almost all of the energy of is (86)
40 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

Fig. 7. Pulse g (t) for the GMSK signal. (a)

In (83) and (84)

(87)

where [37]

(b)
Fig. 8. (a) Real parts of the GMSK signal with T = 8T (solid line) and of
its approximation in terms of 2 PAM signals (dotted line). (b) Real parts of the
GMSK signal with T = 8T (solid line) and of its approximating PAM signal
s (t) (dotted line).

erfc

erfc

erfc erfc (88)

In Fig. 8(a) and (b), the behavior of the real part of the GMSK
signal is compared with those of its approximation
in terms of 2 PAM signals and of the only PAM signal ,
respectively. These figures show that even if the only PAM
signal is considered, the approximation turns out to be
very close (compare also the power spectral densities in Fig. 9).
Moreover, the GMSK signal and exhibit practically
indistinguishable cyclostationarity features when the degree of
cyclostationarity is substantial [see Fig. 10 for the conjugate
cyclic spectrum at and Fig. 12 for the slice
of the fourth-order cyclic polyspectrum
at ]. On the contrary, the GMSK signal and
Fig. 9. Power spectral density function estimates of the GMSK signal with
T = 8T (thin line) and of its approximating PAM signal s (t) (thick line).
exhibit different cyclic features when the degree of cyclosta-
tionarity is weak. Indeed, they have different cyclic spectrum
at (see Fig. 11), and the difference remains
even if both the PAM signals and are considered for
the approximation.
VI. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, we present a novel representation of general
binary CPM signals in terms of a sum of PAM signals. Both
integer and noninteger modulation indices are considered. The
representation is used to derive the higher order temporal and
NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 41

The results in this paper can be used to determine both the

cycle frequencies and the cyclic cumulants for any binary CPM
signal. Such information is valuable in designing and analyzing
cyclostationarity-exploiting signal processing algorithms such
as detectors, parameter-estimators, signal separators, and mod-
ulation classifiers.

APPENDIX A
In this Appendix, the proof of (13) is reported.
Let us group all vectors T into
classes according to the following rule: and belong to
the same class if and only if for some , it results
Fig. 10. Magnitude of the conjugate second-order cyclic spectrum estimates that
at  = 1=2T of the GMSK signal with T = 8T (thin line) and of its
approximating PAM signal s (t) (thick line). (A.1)

where

Fig. 11. Magnitude of the second-order cyclic spectrum estimates at  = 1=T
of the GMSK signal with T = 8T (thin line) and of its approximating PAM
signal s (t) (thick line).
(A.2)
.
Accounting for (A.2), a necessary condition is that the first
elements of must be 1, and the last elements of must
be 0. Furthermore, in each class, only one vector, say , can
have , and all the other vectors of the same class can be
obtained as shifted versions of , provided that the shift is per-
formed shifting 1s into and 0s being shifted out of . More-
over, observing that a vector can be shifted times (shifting
1s into and 0s being shifted out of ), obtaining a vector
belonging to the same class only if the number
(A.3)

is a multiple of , it can be easily recognized that the following

rules for assigning a vector to a specific class hold.
1) If , then ;
2) if is the th element of , then
, where ;
3) if , then ;
where

Fig. 12. Magnitude of the slice for f = 1=2T and f = 0 of the fourth-order
cyclic polyspectrum P (f ; f ; f ) estimates at  = 1=T of the GMSK
signal with T = 8T and h = 0:5 (thin line) and of its approximating PAM
signal s (t) (thick line).

(A.4)
spectral cumulant functions for binary CPM signals. Moreover,
-ary CPM signals are briefly addressed. Since CPM signals From rules 1)–3), it follows that different classes
are cyclostationary, their temporal cumulant functions are pe- exist. Moreover, contains
riodic (or almost-periodic) as functions of time. As such, they elements, and ( ) contains
can be represented as Fourier series, the frequencies of which elements where with an odd number
are called cycle frequencies and the coefficients of which are (i.e., is the power of 2 in the prime factor decomposition
called cyclic cumulant functions. of ). Therefore , each class with odd contains only one
42 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SIGNAL PROCESSING, VOL. 49, NO. 1, JANUARY 2001

TABLE I
CLASSES P , VECTORS b , SETS I , AND VALUES OF d(b) FOR THE VECTORS b IN THE CASE L = 4

element, and each class with even contains the elements APPENDIX B
such that In this Appendix, the proof of (33) and (38) is provided.
The th-order cyclic temporal cross moment function of the
discrete-time-series is given by
(A.5)

As an example, let us consider the case. In Table I, each

vector is assigned to the corresponding class and labeled
as . Moreover, the values of and the sets are reported.
Accounting for (A.5), from (10), it follows that

(B.1)

where, in the last equality, (A.2) and (15) have been accounted
for. Moreover, since the are i.i.d., one has

(A.6) T

where in the last equality, the change of variables

T
and the fact that have
been accounted for.
Finally, from (A.6), (13) easily follows, observing that (B.2)

T Furthermore, observing that

(A.7)

where is defined after (7). (B.3)

NAPOLITANO AND SPOONER: CYCLIC SPECTRAL ANALYSIS OF CPM SIGNALS 43

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[30] A. Napolitano, “Cyclic higher-order statistics: Input/output relations for Chad M. Spooner (S’88–M’92) was born in Des
discrete- and continuous-time MIMO linear almost-periodically time- Moines, IA, on October 5, 1963. From 1981 to
variant systems,” Signal Process., vol. 42, pp. 147–166, Mar. 1995. 1984, he attended Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa
[31] B. Picinbono, “Polyspectra of ordered signals,” IEEE Trans. Inform. Rosa, CA, and received the A.S. degree (with high
Theory, vol. 45, pp. 2239–2252, Nov. 1999. honors) in 1984. He received the B.S. degree from
[32] C. M. Spooner and W. A. Gardner, “The cumulant theory of cyclosta- the University of California, Berkeley, in 1986 and
tionary time-series, Part II: Development and applications,” IEEE Trans. the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from University of
Signal Processing, vol. 42, pp. 3409–3429, Dec. 1994. California, Davis (UC Davis), in 1988 and 1992, all
[33] C. M. Spooner, “Classification of cochannel communication signals in electrical engineering.
using cyclic cumulants,” in Proc. Twenty-Ninth Asilomar Conf. Signals, From 1994 to 1997, he was with Mission Research
Syst., Comput,, Pacific Grove, CA, 1995, pp. 531–536. Corporation, Monterey, CA, where he conducted re-
[34] C. W. Sundberg, “Continuous-phase modulation,” IEEE Commun. search on spectral correlation analysis and its applications. In 1994, he gave a
Mag., vol. 24, pp. 25–38, Apr. 1986. series of invited lectures on cumulant-based signal processing at the University
[35] P. Viravau and P. Gournay, “Corrélation spectrale théorique des modu- of Napoli Federico II. From 1997 to 1999, he was a Consultant with Innovative
lations CPM—Partie II: Méthode de calcul générale et analyse,” Ann. Algorithms, San Francisco, CA, for which he conducted research on automatic
Télécommun., vol. 53, no. 7–8, pp. 279–288, 1998. modulation classification and interference-tolerant signal-parameter estimation.
[36] D. Vučic and M. Obradović , “Spectral correlation evaluation of MSK He returned to Mission Research Corporation in 1999. His research interests in-
and offset QPSK modulation,” Signal Process., vol. 78, pp. 363–367, clude weak-signal detection and parameter estimation, automatic modulation
Nov. 1999. classification, the theory of the higher order statistics of cyclostationary signals,
[37] “The integrator,” http://www.integrals.com, powered by Mathematica. wavelet-based image classification, and the design of secure communication
systems.
Dr. Spooner received the 1992 Award for Excellence in Ph.D. Research from
the UC Davis Chapter of Sigma Xi and the 1995 UC Davis Allen G. Marr Prize
Antonio Napolitano (M’95) was born in Napoli, in the physical sciences and engineering for his doctoral work.
Italy, on February 7, 1964. He received the Dr. Eng.
degree (summa cum laude) in electronic engineering
in 1990 and the Ph.D. degree in electronic and
computer engineering in 1994, both from the
University of Napoli Federico II.
In 1994 and 1995, he was Appointed Professor of
Electrical Communications for the Diploma degree
at the University of Salerno, Salerno, Italy. Since
1995, he has been an Assistant Professor with the
Department of Electronic and Telecommunication
Engineering, University of Napoli Federico II, where, since 1999, he has been
an Appointed Professor of Radar Theory and Methods. From January to June
1997, he was with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
University of California, Davis, as Post-Doctoral Research Associate. His
research interests include statistical signal processing, system identification,
and the theory of the higher order statistics of nonstationary signals.
Dr. Napolitano received the Best Paper of the Year Award from the Euro-
pean Association for Signal Processing (EURASIP) in 1995 for his paper enti-
tled “Cyclic higher-order statistics: Input/output relations for discrete- and con-
tinuous-time MIMO linear almost-periodically time-variant systems” (Signal
Process., vol. 42, Mar. 1995).