Cellular Wireless Networks

and
Mobile Internet Protocol &
Wireless Application Protocol

Cellular Network Organization

Use multiple low-power transmitters (100 W or

less)
Areas divided into cells

Each served by its own antenna

Served by base station consisting of transmitter,
receiver, and control unit
Band of frequencies allocated
Cells set up such that antennas of all neighbors are
equidistant (hexagonal pattern)

Frequency Reuse

Adjacent cells assigned different frequencies to

avoid interference or crosstalk
Objective is to reuse frequency in nearby cells

10 to 50 frequencies assigned to each cell

Transmission power controlled to limit power at that
frequency escaping to adjacent cells
The issue is to determine how many cells must
intervene between two cells using the same frequency

Approaches to Cope with

Increasing Capacity

Adding new channels

Frequency borrowing frequencies are taken from
adjacent cells by congested cells
Cell splitting cells in areas of high usage can be
split into smaller cells
Cell sectoring cells are divided into a number of
wedge-shaped sectors, each with their own set of
channels
Microcells antennas move to buildings, hills, and
lamp posts

Cellular System Overview

Cellular Systems Terms

Base Station (BS) includes an antenna, a

controller, and a number of receivers
Mobile telecommunications switching office
(MTSO) connects calls between mobile units
Two types of channels available between mobile
unit and BS

Control channels used to exchange information

having to do with setting up and maintaining calls
Traffic channels carry voice or data connection
between users

Steps in an MTSO Controlled

Call between Mobile Users

Mobile unit initialization

When a mobile unit is turned on, it scans and selects the strongest
setup control channel used for the system & the mobile unit has
automatically selected the BS antenna of the cell within which it
will operate

Mobile-originated call

A mobile unit originates a call by sending the number of the called

unit on the preselected setup channel
The receiver at the mobile unit first check the setup channel is idle
by examining information in the forward from the BS channel

Cont

Paging

MTSO then attempts to complete the connection to the called unit

The MTSO sends paging message to certain BSs depending on
the called mobile number

Call accepted

The called mobile unit recognizes its number on the setup channel
being monitored and responds to that BS, which sends the
response to the MTSO
MTSO selects an available traffic channel within each BS cell and
notifies each BS, which in turn notifies its mobile unit

Cont

Ongoing call

The two mobile units exchange voice/data signals

while the connection is maintained

Handoff

If a mobile unit moves out of range of one cell and

into the range of another during a connection, the
traffic channel has to change to one assigned to the
BS in the new cell

Handof

A procedure changing the

assignment of a mobile unit from
one BS to another as the mobile
moves from one cell to another

Handoff Strategies Used to Determine

Instant of Handoff

Relative signal strength

The mobile unit is handoff from BS A to BS B when

the signal strength at B first exceeds that at A

Relative signal strength with threshold

Handoff occurs if

The signal at the current Bs is sufficiently weak(less than

a predefined threshold)
The other signal is stronger of the two

Cont

Relative signal strength with hysteresis

Think of the handoff mechanism as having two

states, while the mobile assigned to Bs A, the
mechanism will generate a handoff when the
relative signal strength reaches or exceeds the H,
once the mobile is assigned to B, it remains so until
the relative signal strength fall below H, at which
point it is handed back to A.

Traffic Engineering

Ideally, available channels would equal

number of subscribers active at one time
In practice, not feasible to have capacity
handle all possible load
For N simultaneous user capacity and L
subscribers

L < N nonblocking system

L > N blocking system

Blocking System Performance

Questions

Probability that call request is blocked?

What capacity is needed to achieve a certain
upper bound on probability of blocking?
What is the average delay?
What capacity is needed to achieve a certain
average delay?

Generation of Cellular
Networks

First Generation System

Second Generation TDMA
Third Generation system

First-Generation Analog

Advanced Mobile Phone Service (AMPS)

Provides analog traffic channels

In North America, two 25-MHz bands allocated to AMPS

One for transmission from base to mobile unit

One for transmission from mobile unit to base

Each band split in two to encourage competition

Includes Numeric Assignment Module(NAM)
NAM contains the telephone numbers of the phone which
is assigned by service provider and serial number of the
phone

AMPS Operation

Subscriber initiates call by keying in phone number

and presses send key
MTSO verifies number and authorizes user
MTSO issues message to users cell phone indicating
send and receive traffic channels
MTSO sends ringing signal to called party
Party answers; MTSO establishes circuit and initiates
billing information
Either party hangs up; MTSO releases circuit, frees
channels, completes billing

Second Generation TDMA

Have been to develop to provide

higher quality signals, higher data
rates for support of digital services
and greater capacity

Differences Between First and

Second Generation Systems

Digital traffic channels first-generation systems are

almost purely analog; second-generation systems are
digital
Encryption all second generation systems provide
encryption to prevent eavesdropping(To listen secretly to the
private conversation of others.)
Error detection and correction second-generation digital
traffic allows for detection and correction, giving clear
voice reception
Channel access second-generation systems allow
channels to be dynamically shared by a number of users

Mobile Wireless TDMA Design

Considerations

Number of logical channels (number of time slots

in TDMA frame): 8
Maximum cell radius (R): 35 km
Frequency: region around 900 MHz
Maximum vehicle speed (Vm):250 km/hr
Maximum coding delay: approx. 20 ms
Maximum delay spread (m): 10 s
Bandwidth: Not to exceed 200 kHz (25 kHz per
channel)

Second Generation
Cellular Telephone

GSM(Global System Communication)

IS-136
IS-95
GSM:-was developed to provide a
common 2nd generation technologies
through out the contient

Overall GSM Architecture

The Three Interfaces in

GSM

Um The air interface between the

mobile station (MS) and the BTS.
Abis The interface between the
(BSS) and BSC(Base Station
controller)
A The interface between the BSC
and MSC.

GSM Network Architecture

Mobile Station

Mobile station communicates across Um interface

(air interface) with base station transceiver in same
cell as mobile unit
Mobile equipment (ME) physical terminal, such
as a telephone or PCS

ME includes radio transceiver, digital signal processors

and subscriber identity module (SIM)

GSM subscriber units are generic until SIM is

inserted

SIMs roam, not necessarily the subscriber devices

Base Station Subsystem (BSS)

BSS consists of base station controller and

one or more base transceiver stations (BTS)
Each BTS defines a single cell

Includes radio antenna, radio transceiver and a

link to a base station controller (BSC)

BSC reserves radio frequencies, manages

handoff of mobile unit from one cell to
another within BSS, and controls paging

Network Subsystem (NS)

NS provides link between cellular network and

public switched telecommunications networks

Controls handoffs between cells in different BSSs

Authenticates users and validates accounts
Enables worldwide roaming of mobile users

Central element of NS is the mobile switching

center (MSC)

Mobile Switching Center (MSC)

Databases

Home location register (HLR) database stores

information about each subscriber that belongs to it
Visitor location register (VLR) database maintains
information about subscribers currently physically in
the region
Authentication center database (AuC) used for
authentication activities, holds encryption keys
Equipment identity register database (EIR) keeps
track of the type of equipment that exists at the
mobile station

Advantages of CDMA Cellular

Frequency diversity frequency-dependent

transmission impairments have less effect on signal
Multipath resistance chipping codes used for
CDMA exhibit low cross correlation and low
autocorrelation
Privacy privacy is inherent since spread spectrum
is obtained by use of noise-like signals
Graceful degradation system only gradually
degrades as more users access the system

Third Generation

A wireless communication is to
provide a fairly high speed wireless
to support

Multimedia data
Data and video in addition to voice

View of Third-Generation
Capabilities

Voice quality comparable to the public switched

telephone network
144 kbps data rate available to users in high-speed
motor vehicles over large areas
384 kbps available to pedestrians standing or moving
slowly over small areas
Support for 2.048 Mbps for office use
Symmetrical / asymmetrical data transmission rates
Support for both packet switched and circuit switched
data services

View of Third-Generation
Capabilities

An adaptive interface to the Internet to reflect

efficiently the common asymmetry between
inbound and outbound traffic
More efficient use of the available spectrum in
general
Support for a wide variety of mobile equipment
Flexibility to allow the introduction of new
services and technologies

Operation of Mobile IP

Routers are used to move IP datagrams

through the network using IP addresses
that are fixed and controlled by TCP
connection that knows the IP addresses
of the communicating computers

Mobile IP deals with the problem that

arises when the IP address changes
while the TCP connection is active

Definitions

Home Network: Network where the

mobile node belongs originally
Home Address: IP address of the
mobile node in the home network
(static)
Foreign Network: Network diferent
from the home where the mobile
node is connected at the moment.

Definitions

Foreign Agent: Typically a router on

the foreign network. It controls traffic
in that network.
Home Agent: Typically a router on the
home network that controls traffic in
that network
Care-of Address: Temporary IP
address assigned to the mobile unit
by the foreign network

Operation of Mobile IPNetwork Level PD

Encapsulation and Tunnelling

IP datagram to A

As response travels
to X due to fixed IP o

IP Mobile Basic
Capabilities

Discovery: A mobile unit uses a discovery

procedure to identify prospective home
agents and foreign agents.
Registration: A mobile node uses an
authenticated registration procedure to
inform its home agent of its care-of address
Tunnelling: Tunnelling is used to forward IP
datagrams from a home address to a careof address.

Discovery

Need to determine if the node is in its

home network or on a foreign network.
This is done through Advertisement.
A transmission from the home network
to a foreign network can occur at any
time without notification to the network
layer (IP layer)
discovery for a mobile node is a
continuous process.

Discovery Move
Detection

Mobile nodes may move between

networks due to some handof
mechanism without the IP level being
aware of it.
Agent Discovery Process is intended to
enable the agent to detect such move.
There are two algorithms used for this:

Use of Lifetime Field

Use of Network Prefix

Move Detection
Algorithms

Lifetime Filed: When a mobile node(MN)

receives an agent advertisement from a
foreign agent that it is currently using or that it
is now going to register with, it records the
lifetime field as a timer

If the timer expires before the MN receives another agent

advertisement from the agent, then the node assumes that
it lost contact with that agent.
If the MN has received an agent advertisement from
another agent, and that advertisement has not yet expired,
the MN can register with this new agent.

Move Detection
Algorithms

Network Prefix: The mobile node (MN)

checks whether any newly received
agent advertisement is on the same
network as the nodes current care-ofaddress.

If it is not, the MN assumes that it has

moved and may register with the agent
whose advertisement the mobile node has
just received.

Registration

Once a mobile node has

recognized that it is on a foreign
network and has acquired a careof address, it needs to alert a
home agent on its home network
and request that the home agent
forward its IP traffic

Registration
The registration process involves four
steps:
1.

2.

3.

4.

The mobile node requests the forwarding service by

sending a registration request to the foreign agent
that the mobile node wants to use.
The foreign agent relays this request to the mobile
nodes home agent.
The home agent either accepts or denies the request
and sends a registration reply to the foreign agent.
The foreign agent relays this reply to the mobile
node

Tunnelling

Once a mobile node is registered with a

home agent, the home agent must be able
to intercept IP datagrams sent to the mobile
nodes home address so that these
datagrams can be forwarded via tunnelling

To forward an IP datagram to a care-ofaddress, the home agent puts the entire IP

datagram into an outer IP datagram. This is
a form of encapsulation

Tunnelling

Three options for encapsulation are allowed

for Mobile IP:

IP-within-IP encapsulation: IP datagram is

inserted into a new IP datagram with the care-of
address.
Minimal Encapsulation: Less overhead, only a
few fields are added in the outer datagram.
Generic routing encapsulation (GRE): This is a
generic encapsulation procedure that was
developed prior to the development of Mobile IP

Wireless Application
Protocol

Is a universal, open standard developed to

provide mobile users of wireless phones
and other wireless terminals access to
telephony and information systems,
including the Internet and the Web.
WAP is designed to work with all wireless
network technologies
WAP is based on existing Internet
standards

Mobile Devices Limitations

for Data Services

limited processors, memory and battery life.

The user interface is limited and the display
is small.
The wireless networks are characterized by
relatively low bandwidth, high latency, and
unpredictable availability and stability
compared to wired connections

WAP specifications

A programming model based on the

WWW programming model.
A Markup language, the Wireless Markup
Language (WML), adhering to XML
A specification of a small browser
suitable for a mobile, wireless terminal
A lightweight communication protocol
stack.
A framework for wireless telephony
applications (WTAs).