MIMO Zak-OTFS: Channel Estimation, Detection, and Throughput Analysis

Abstract: Zak-Orthogonal Time Frequency Space (Zak-OTFS) modulation has demonstrated substantial performance gains over cyclic-prefix orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (CP-OFDM) in highly time- and frequency-selective channels. In this paper, we extend Zak-OTFS to a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) framework. We first derive a complete system model for MIMO Zak-OTFS based directly on the physical multipath channel; ours is the first work to do so. We then propose an efficient channel estimation method using structured pilot placement in the delay-Doppler (DD) domain. The proposed approach is evaluated under the standardized CDL-C channel model, demonstrating that the advantages of Zak-OTFS observed in SISO scenarios extend to MIMO systems, particularly its robustness to Doppler and inter-carrier interference (ICI). We identify a fundamental crossover behavior: CP-OFDM performs slightly better at low SNR and low Doppler, while Zak-OTFS excels at higher SNR or under severe Doppler dispersion. Furthermore, we show that the crossover points for SNR and Doppler shift inversely to each other. We also observe that Zak-OTFS, particularly with MIMO, exhibits increased sensitivity to high values of pilot-to-data power ratio (PDR), but has a similar optimal PDR as CP-OFDM.