Communication Systems

By Ihsan Ul Haq

1
 Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
• Most circuits in electronic communication are
used to manipulate signals to produce a
desired result.

• All signal processing circuits involve:

– Gain
– Attenuation

2
Attenuation

3.3
 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Gain
– Gain means amplification. It is the ratio of a circuit’s output to its
input.
output Vout
AV = =
input Vin

Figure 2-1: An amplifier has gain.

 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
• Most amplifiers are also power amplifiers, so the same
procedure can be used to calculate power gain AP where Pin
is the power input and Pout is the power output.
Power gain (Ap) = Pout / Pin

• Example:

The power output of an amplifier is 6 watts (W). The power

gain is 80. What is the input power?

Ap = Pout / Pin therefore Pin = Pout / Ap

Pin = 6 / 80 = 0.075 W = 75 mW

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
• An amplifier is cascaded when two or more
stages are connected together.
• The overall gain is the product of the
individual circuit gains.
• Example:
Three cascaded amplifiers have power gains of 5, 2, and 17.
The input power is 40 mW. What is the output power?

Ap = A1 × A2 × A3 = 5 × 2 × 17 = 170
Ap = Pout / Pin therefore Pout = ApPin
Pout = 170 (40 × 10-3) = 6.8W

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Attenuation
– Attenuation refers to a loss introduced by a circuit
or component. If the output signal is lower in
amplitude than the input, the circuit has loss or
attenuation.
– The letter A is used to represent attenuation
– Attenuation A = output/input = Vout/Vin
– Circuits that introduce attenuation have a gain
that is less than 1.
– With cascaded circuits, the total attenuation is the
product of the individual attenuations.

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels

Figure 2-3: A voltage divider introduces attenuation.

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 Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels

Figure 2-4: Total attenuation is the product of individual attenuations of each cascaded circuit.
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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels
– The decibel (dB) is a unit of measure used to
express the gain or loss of a circuit.
• The decibel was originally created to express hearing
response.
• A decibel is one-tenth of a bel.

– When gain and attenuation are both converted

into decibels, the overall gain or attenuation of a
circuit can be computed by adding individual gains
or attenuations, expressed in decibels.
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11
12
13
 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels: Decibel Calculations
– Voltage Gain or Attenuation
dB = 20 log Vout/ Vin

– Current Gain or Attenuation

dB = 20 log Iout/ Iin

– Power Gain or Attenuation

dB = 10 log Pout/ Pin

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels: Decibel Calculations
• Example:
An amplifier has an input of 3 mV and an output of
5 V. What is the gain in decibels?

dB = 20 log 5/0.003
= 20 log 1666.67
= 20 (3.22)
= 64.4

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels: Decibel Calculations
• Example:
A filter has a power input of 50 mW and an output of 2
mW. What is the gain or attenuation?
dB = 10 log (2/50)
= 10 log (0.04)
= 10 (−1.398)
= −13.98

– If the decibel figure is positive, that denotes a gain.

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels: Antilogs
– The antilog is the number obtained when the base is
raised to the logarithm which is the exponent.
– Antilogs are used to calculate input or output voltage
or power, given the decibel gain or attenuation and
the output or input.
– The antilog is the base 10 raised to the dB/10 power.
– The antilog is readily calculated on a scientific
calculator.

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 2-1: Gain, Attenuation,
and Decibels
Decibels: dBm and dBc
– When a decibel value is computed by comparing a
power value to 1 mW, the result is a value called
the dBm. This is a useful reference value.
– The value dBc is a decibel gain attenuation figure
where the reference is the carrier.

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 Signals and Noise

• In every case we have a signal, which is used to

carry useful information; and in every case there
is noise, which enters the system from a variety
of sources and degrades the signal, reducing the
quality of the communication. Keeping the ratio
between signal and noise sufficiently high is the
basis for a great deal of the work that goes into
the design of a communication system. This
signal-to-noise ratio, abbreviated S/N and almost
always expressed in decibels.

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Signal

20
 Thermal Noise
• The thermal noise power is proportional to the
bandwidth over which a system operates and is
given by:
• PN = kTB
• where
– PN = noise power in watts
– k = Boltzmann’s constant, 1.38 × 10 joules/kelvin (J/K)
−23

– T = temperature in kelvins
– B = noise power bandwidth in hertz
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 Example
• A resistor at a temperature of 25 °C is
connected across the input of an amplifier
with a bandwidth of 50 kHz. How much noise
does the resistor supply to the input of the
amplifier?

22
 Signal-to-Noise Ratio

• Maintaining an adequate ratio of signal power to noise

power is essential for any communication system.
Obviously there are two basic ways to improve S/N:
– increase the signal power or reduce the noise power.
– Increasing signal power beyond a certain point can cause
problems, particularly where portable, battery powered
devices are concerned.
– Reducing noise power requires limiting bandwidth and, if
possible, reducing the noise temperature of a system.
– The system bandwidth must be large enough to
accommodate the signal bandwidth, but should be no
larger than that.

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 Example

The power of a signal is 10 mW and the power of the noise is 1 μW; what are the values
of SNR and SNRdB ?

Solution
The values of SNR and SNRdB can be calculated as follows:

3.24
 Example

The values of SNR and SNRdB for a noiseless channel are

We can never achieve this ratio in real life; it is an ideal.

3.25
Two cases of SNR: a high SNR and a low SNR

3.26
 Noise Figure

• Noise figure describes the way in which a

device adds noise to a signal and thereby
degrades the signal-to-noise ratio. It is defined
as follows:

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 Noise figure (cont.)

• It is a measure of the degradation of SNR due

SNRi
to the noise added - F 1
SNRo
• Implies that SNR gets worse as we process the
signal