Profile detection in multiuser digital subscriber line systems

Multiuser transmission methods for digital subscriber line (DSL) systems have become of interest with the potential for increased data rate and loop reach. These methods often assume that the set of crosstalk interferers, called the crosstalk profile, and their associated channel responses are known. For DSL systems, the interferers are often uncoordinated, so that in a dynamic environment where DSL transmitters can energize and deenergize, the crosstalk profile cannot be transmitted to the user of interest. While the crosstalk channel estimation problem in a dynamic environment can be intractable for general transmission systems, channel and crosstalk analysis can make use of the specific DSL environment. Namely, the physical channels in a DSL system do not change rapidly, and hence estimates of the crosstalk channel can be saved for future reference. For this reason, we introduce the concept of a channel profile. We develop several algorithms to detect the crosstalk profile and investigate the asymptotic behavior of the new algorithms. Simulations show that for typical crosstalk interference scenarios, the observation time to determine the correct crosstalk profile at probability of error less than 10 3 can be less than 2 ms.