Abstract Optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (Optical OFDM) is a key modulation technique for high-speed optical communication systems; however, its performance is significantly degraded by chromatic dispersion and phase noise, which impair subcarrier orthogonality and introduce inter-symbol and inter-carrier interference. To overcome these limitations, this work proposes an enhanced signal detection scheme for optical OFDM based on a hybrid equalization framework integrated with quasi-reduced maximum likelihood detection (QRM-MLD). The proposed approach is evaluated against conventional detection methods, including zero-forcing equalization, minimum mean square error, maximum likelihood, and successive interference cancellation. MATLAB-based simulation results demonstrate that the hybrid QRM-MLD scheme achieves substantial performance gains under various channel impairment conditions. At a target bit error rate of 10 −3 , the proposed method requires up to 10 dB lower signal-to-noise ratio compared to uncompensated optical OFDM and offers approximately 2–7 dB improvement over conventional detection schemes. Capacity analysis further confirms its superiority, achieving a value of 290 at an SNR of 50 dB. Overall, the proposed hybrid detection strategy significantly improves detection accuracy, spectral efficiency, and robustness, making it a strong candidate for next-generation high-capacity optical OFDM communication systems.
K et al. (Tue,) studied this question.