Module 2 Basics of Communication

Sampurna Chakraborty IPSTAR Training Department July 2008

Objective
At the end of this module you should be able to Learn about electromagnetic waves and spectrum. Describe a general communication system function. Explain the meaning of modulation, encoding and its purpose. Explain meaning of bit rate, symbol rate, code rate. List the types of access methods with emphasis to FDMA, TDMA, ALOHA, S-ALOHA. Understand OFDM concept and its usefulness.

Electromagnetic Waves and Spectrum

Electromagnetic Spectrum
Frequencies used for commercial satellite communication

Data Communication Technologies

Communication technologies and Population Density

A Communication System

Communication System Block Diagram

Information Source Channel Encoder

Modulator

Source

Transmitter

Noise

Channel Destination
Destination

Receiver
Channel Decoder Demodulator

Communication System : Constraints

Available bandwidth Permissible power Inherent noise level of the system

Modulation

Need for modulation

Make the signal suitable for transmission across the type of channel available To make the signal capable to travel longer distances To make the signal more immune towards noise So that more than one signal may be simultaneously transmitted without interference from other signals So as to enable construction of smaller antenna

Modem

(= Modulator + Demodulator)

The equipment that is used to convert digital signals into analog format is a MODEM= modulator and demodulator. A modem accepts a serial data stream and converts it into an analog format that matches the transmission medium.

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

With this method the phase of the carrier changes between different phases determined by the logic states of the input bit stream. There are several different types of phase shift key (PSK) modulators.

m
1 2 3 4

M
2 4 8 16

No. of Phase shifts

2 phases 4 phases 8 phases 16 phases

Name
Binary Phase Shift Keying Quadrature Phase Shift Keying 8 Phase Shift Keying 16 Phase Shift Keying

Acronym
BPSK QPSK 8 PSK 16 PSK

M=2^m; m is the number of bits used to represent one symbol of modulation M is the number of phase shifts in the modulation

BPSK

m =1 ; M=2

Binary Phase Shift Keying: BPSK

In this modulator the carrier assumes one of two phases. A logic 1 produces no phase change and a logic 0 produces a 180 phase change. The output waveform for this modulator is above.

QPSK

m=2;

M=4

With 4 PSK, 2 bits are processed to produce a single phase change. In this case each symbol consists of 2 bits, which are referred to as a dibit. The actual phases that are produced by a 4 PSK modulator are shown in the table below.

01

00

01

11

00

Quadrature Phase Shift Keying: QPSK

11

10

10

Symbol Rate or Baud rate

Symbol rate

Bit rate__________ # of bit Tx with each symbol

The signal bandwidth for the communication channel depends on the symbol rate, not the bit rate.

Modulation and Bandwidth Efficiency

Modulation Format BPSK QPSK 8PSK 16QAM Theoretical bandwidth efficiency limits 1 bit/second/Hz 2 bit/second/Hz 3 bit/second/Hz 4 bit/second/Hz

Effect of high level modulation on Communication

Higher level modulations are more bandwidth efficient Higher level modulations have closer symbol, therefore, more subject to errors due to noise and distortion Such a signal may have to be transmitted with extra power (to effectively spread symbols out more) and thus reduces power efficiency as compared to simpler schemes.

Modulation types Comparison

Modulation Types BPSK Higher modulation types needs less bandwidth but need more uplink power QPSK 8PSK : 1 bit per symbol : 2 bits per symbol : 3 bits per symbol

16 QAM : 4 bits per symbol

Bandwidth Requirement
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Case Study
Case Study: Customer A has lease capacity X MHz which is fully occupied with 6
QPSK carriers. Customer A wants to put one more link ( 2 carriers) without leasing more bandwidth. Solution: Change the modulation from QPSK to 8-PSK for all carriers

Advantage : solution for limited bandwidth option

Disadvantage: Need higher uplink power -> HPA/ODU size need to recheck if it is enough AND check power utilization on transponder is within limit

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Encoding

Purpose of Coding
In communications systems, the altering of the characteristics of a signal to make the signal more suitable for an intended application, such as optimizing the signal for transmission, improving transmission quality and fidelity, modifying the signal spectrum, increasing the information content, providing error detection and /or correction, and providing data security is done through coding.

Principle of Forward Error Correction

In information theory and coding, a code conforms to specific rules of construction so that departures from this construction in the received signal can generally be automatically detected and corrected In general, these methods put redundant information into the data stream following certain algebraic or geometric relations so that the decoded stream, if damaged in transmission, can be corrected. The effectiveness of the coding scheme is measured in terms of the coding gain, which is the difference of the SNR levels of the uncoded and coded systems required to reach the same BER levels.

Example : (7,4) Systematic Block Code

Messages 000 100 010 110 001 101 011 111 000 100 010 110 001 101 011 111 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 Code Words 000 110 011 101 111 001 100 010 111 011 110 000 010 100 001 111 000 100 010 110 001 101 011 111 000 100 010 110 001 101 011 111 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

Binary block code with k=4 and n=7

Symbol Rate
Formula: SR = DR / (m x R) Where SR = Symbol Rate DR = Data Rate = the customer information rate. m = modulation factor (transmission rate bits per symbol). BPSK=1, QPSK=2, 8PSK=3 etc R = Code Rate ; Example : 4/7

Coding: Turbo Product Codes

A product code is a multidimensional array of block codes. It is a large code built from small code word blocks. Encoding can be implemented as a block code on rows and then columns (for 2-D codes) and rows, columns, and z-axis (for 3-D codes). Decoding is more complicated and performed iteratively one block at a time in SISO decoder. The rows are decoded first followed by the columns for 2-D codes and rows, columns, z-axis for 3-D codes. This process is iterated several times to maximize performance.

Turbo Product Codes: Example

(8x4)x(8x4)
D D D D E E E E D D D D E E E E D D D D E E E E D E D E D E D E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E

D: Data E: Parity/Extended bits

Effect of High Code Rate on Communication

;k information length n codeword length High Code Rate consumes less bandwidth as it has less parity bits Lower Rate code consumes high power.

Code rate R = k/n

Examples of codes and their applications

Code Applications DVB : Viterbi + RS VSAT : Viterbi or Turbo Viterbi Coding requires higher power same bandwidth requirement as turbo coding Reed Solomon Coding requires same power higher bandwidth requirement as turbo coding Turbo Coding requires less power than Viterbi coding same bandwidth requirement as Viterbi coding some modems may not support
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Power

Examples of Codes Viterbi : { 1/2, 2/3, 3/4, 5/6, 7/8 } Turbo : { 5/6, 3/4, 7/8 } RS : {188/204 , 112/126 , }

Bandwidth

Coding and BER

Higher FEC rate requires higher Eb/No
1.00E-03 Viterbi Rate 1/2 Viterbi Rate 3/4 Viterbi Rate 7/8 1.00E-04

Relates to Service Quality BER (Bit Error Rate)

BER

1.00E-05

1.00E-06

1.00E-07

1.00E-08
3 6 3.3 3.6 3.9 4.2 4.5 4.8 5.1 5.4 5.7 6.3 6.6 6.9 7.2 7.5 7.8 8.1 8.4 8.7 9
30

Eb/No
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Case Study Case Study: A broadcast carrier of 4.5MHz bandwidth (QPSK- 3/4) is operating with
maximum allowable EIRPdn level. A group of viewers from location X cannot receive well due to low EIRPdn at their location and thus face low link margin. THAICOM Headquarter (CND) does not allow the customer to increase uplink power because it will overuse power on transponder. Solution 1: Using bigger receive antenna size ( >=3m) will increase link margin. This solution may be hard to implement if many receive sites (home users) involved. Solution 2: Reducing FEC from 3/4 to 1/2 will improve link margin Advantage: Link margin improves without overusing transponder power. Disadvantage: Needs to reduce information rate to keep same symbol rate ( and bandwidth).

Bandwidth = Symbol Rate x BT Product = Information Rate x ( 1/ FEC) x (1/ Mod Type) x (1 / RS) x BT Product
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Access Methods

Multiple Access : Protocols Channel Access Protocols

FDMA TDMA CDMA

( Frequency Division Multiple Access, Time Division Multiple Access , Code Division Multiple Access)

AlOHA S-Aloha
( AlOHA Slotted ALOHA)

Fixed Assignment

Random Assignment

Multiple Access: Example Bandwidth=BHz; Users=N

FDMA
Divide frequency band B into N bands then assign each band to each user.

TDMA
Divide time period to NT time slots then assign one time slot (T) to each user and each user occupies full bandwidth B Hz.

CDMA
Choose N orthogonal waveforms where each waveforms occupies the total BW B Hz and assign one of the waveform to each user.

N bands

N time slots

N orthogonal codes

Random Multiple Access: ALOHA example

Retransmit

u1 u2 u3
channel

collision

success

Random Process : S-ALOHA example u1

T

u2
T

u3
T

channel
T

Application Traffic

Serial No.

Protocol

Type of Traffic

Aloha

Login

S-Aloha

Bursty

TDMA/FDMA/CDMA

Continuous

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing OFDM

OFDM Definition
OFDM = Orthogonal FDM Carrier Centres are put on orthogonal frequencies Orthogonality= Peak of each signal coincides with the trough of other signals

FDM

OFDM

Summary
From this module the trainees have: Learnt about Microwave frequencies used for satellite communications. Explain the function of a general communication system. Describe the various Multiple access schemes used for communication. Understand the concept of OFDM and its usefulness in spectral efficiency.

Quiz
This quiz is divided into two sections 1. Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) 2. Reasoning. After completing the Quiz please judge yourself by referring to the Appendix presented at the end of this module. N.B. For MCQs, you can select more than one answer

MCQs
1. Transverse Polarization consists of a. Horizontal and Vertical Polarization b. Elliptical and Circular Polarization c. Horizontal and Circular Polarization d. Elliptical and Horizontal Polarization 2. Which modulation scheme is the most bandwidth efficient? a. BPSK b. QPSK c. 16PSK d. 8PSK 3. Which modulation scheme requires maximum power resource? a. BPSK b. QPSK c. 8PSK d. 16PSK

Reasoning
4. Given the data rate of a signal as DR, what is the symbol rate if the transmitter use 8PSK type of modulation and (7,4) block code? 5. What do you understand by orthogonal FDM? Why do you think it is preferred to FDM? 6. Microwave frequency range is 3-30GHz. True/False