ESE680: Wireless Sensor Networks

Special Topics in Embedded Systems

Physical Layer - Part II Lecture #6

Prof. Rahul Mangharam

Administrivia
Lab #1
Due on Today (before lecture)

Lab #2
Out on Today Due Thursday, Feb 19 (before lecture)

Outline of Previous Lecture

Completion of Lecture on MAC Protocols

Communication Schemes
Propagation Modes Fading Encoding Schemes Spread Spectrum

Outline of Todays Lecture

Physical Layer for Wireless Communications
802.11, Bluetooth and Zigbee

Fundamentals of RF communications
Basic concepts Modulation techniques

IEEE 802.15 Standard

Overview Physical Layer of IEEE 802.15.4

Network Communication Protocols

Network communication protocols differ from net to net and determine who does what, when and how. Communication protocols are based on communication layers

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OSI Model
International Standards Organizations Reference Model for Open Systems Interconnection
Determines the protocol interface, not the actual implementation

Physical Layer
The actual data is communicated via this layer Data arrives, interrupt is generated, data is accepted

Data Link Layer

Responsible for detecting and correcting transmission errors (EDC/ECC) and flow control
e.g. synchronize the speeds of sending and receiving

Network Layer
Takes a message, breaks it into packets (for packet-switching networks) Takes care of congestion control (whether sender should slow down) and routing (which link to put the packet into)

Each node must have at least these layers, so that they can function as a store and forward node (i.e. take a packet, and send it to the next hop towards the next destination)
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OSI Model
The bottom layers perform the communication of data Transport Layer
Acts as the interface between the application programs and the underlying physical network Network independent software (device drives) are implemented at this layer May be used as a source of additional info (reliability, efficiency, etc.)

Session Layer
Establishes the connection with the remote host Responsible for sending and receiving the initial messages in order to establish that the channel is open and operational

Presentation Layer
After session establishment, messages are taken from the application and given to this layer, which performs transformations on the data to/from the application
(e.g. MPEG compression/decompression, encryption for MIME messages, etc)
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What does the Physical Layer do?

Code, transmit, receive and decode frames Activate and deactivate radio transceiver Energy detection (ED) within current channel Link quality indicator (LQI) for received packets Channel selection Clear Channel Assessment (CCA) for CSMA-CA

Physical Layers of Wireless Communications

WiFi (IEEE 802.11) Bluetooth (IEEE 802.15) Zigbee (IEEE 802.15.4) RFID

IEEE 802 - Wireless Standards

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Wireless Network Applications

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IEEE 802.11
Designed for high data-rate networks
Internet/LAN connectivity Entertainment systems Streaming video

High power Device power device lifetime: 2~3 hrs (laptops) Wired power supplied in most cases

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IEEE 802.11
Direct-sequence spread spectrum
Operating in 2.4 GHz ISM band Data-rates of 1 and 2 Mbps

Frequency-hopping spread spectrum

Operating in 2.4 GHz ISM band Data rates of 1 and 2 Mbps

Infrared
1 and 2 Mbps Wavelength between 850 and 950 nm

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IEEE 802.11
IEEE 802.11a
5-GHz band Provides rates of 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, 54 Mbps Uses orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) Sub-carrier modulated using BPSK, QPSK, 16-QAM or 64QAM

IEEE 802.11b
Provides data rates of 5.5 and 11 Mbps Complementary Code Keying (CCK) modulation scheme

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IEEE 802.11
IEEE 802.11a
40 mW 30 m range

IEEE 802.11b
100 mW 100 m range

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Bluetooth
Designed for medium data-rate networks
Computer cable replacement Gaming controllers Phone microphones Mobile device file transfer

Fairly low power Device power lifetime is measured in weeks to months

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Bluetooth
Unlicensed 2.4 GHz radio band
ISM band Used by microwave ovens, 802.11 Fast Frequency Hopping 1600 hops per second 79 channels 1 MHz spacing 200 s switching time

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Bluetooth - Power & Range

Basic 10m range(0 dBm radio) Extended 100m range(20 dBm) Power classes
Class 1
Maximum output power: 100mW (20dBm) Minimum output power: 1mW (0dBm)

Class 2
Maximum output power: 2.5mW (4dBm) Minimum output power: 0.25mW (-6dBm)

Class 3 Maximum output power: 1mW (0dBm)

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Zigbee
Designed for low data-rate systems
Lighting Heating/Cooling Appliances

Extremely Low Power Devices have lifetime measured in years

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Zigbee
2.4 GHz Band
16-ary O-QPSK Sixteen 5 MHz channels Data-rate up to 250 Kbps

868/915 MHz Band

BPSK 868 MHz European ISM band
One 2 MHz channel 20 kbps

915 MHz North American ISM band

Ten 2 MHz channels 40 kbps

DSSS Chooses from 16 nearly orthogonal PN sequences

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Zigbee - Power & Range

Scalable transmit power to meet range requirements

Low power
1 mW transmit power 10~20m range

High power
60 mW transmit power 100m range

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RFID
Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID)
A system that transmits the identity (in the form of a unique serial number) of an object wirelessly, using radio waves.

RFID System
RFID tag or transponder
Antenna Wireless transducer Encapsulating material

RFID reader or transceiver

Antenna Transceiver Decoder RFID Tag used in Walmart http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFID

Data processing subsystem

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RFID Frequency
Frequency range
Low-Frequency (LF)
LF: 125 -134.2 kHz LF: 140 -148.5 kHz

High-Frequency (HF)
HF: 13.56 MHz

Ultra-High-Frequency (UHF)
UHF: 868 MHz -928 MHz

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Signals
A time-varying event Signals can be periodic or aperiodic A signal can be decomposed into a combination of pure tones, called sine waves, at different frequencies The different sine waves that compose a signal can be plotted as a function of frequency to produce a graph called the frequency spectrum of a signal.

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Signal Bandwidth (1 of 3)
Frequencies in the audio spectrum can be heard by the human ear. The ear hears by detecting very small changes in air pressure. The frequencies ranging from about 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz are in the audio, or sound spectrum. Telephone speech cover the frequency range from about 300 Hz to 3000 Hz. The bandwidth is about 3,000 Hz.

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Signal Bandwidth (2 of 3)
Bandwidth is defined as the frequency band around the carrier frequency containing 99 percent of the signal power Amplitude Modulation (AM) is the variation of the amplitude of a radio wave as to carry information. The bandwidth for an individual AM station is about 10,000 Hz Frequency Modulation (FM) is the variation of the frequency of a radio wave as to carry information. The bandwidth for an individual FM station is about 200,000 Hz The signal broadcast over the air by a television station has a bandwidth of about 6 MHz.

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Signal Bandwidth (3 of 3)
Analog systems:
Most signals occupy a range of frequencies. This frequency range is called the signal bandwidth
Frequency range can be defined by the amount of power contained (say = 50%, > 90% or even > 99% of the signal power

Digital systems:
Rate at which symbols can be transmitted

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Channel Bandwidth
Amplitude Modulation (AM) is transmitted within a band of frequencies from 550 KHz to 1,600 KHz. Telephone carriers multiplex 12 telephone channels on a single cable. Each channel requires about 4 KHz bandwidth. The band of frequencies for telephone carriers is from 60 to 108 KHz The standard frequency assignments for television stations is as follows: channels 2 through 13 are in the very high frequency (VHF) bands and channels 14 through 83 occupy the ultra high frequency (UHF) bands

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Channel Capacity: Noise-free

In this case, the limitation on data rate is simply the bandwidth of the signal If bandwidth is B, then the highest binary signal rate that can be transmitted is 2B bps When multi-level signaling is used, the channel capacity becomes

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Channel capacity is the tightest upper bound on the amount of information that can be reliably transmitted over a communications channel.
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Shannons Capacity Theorem

States the theoretical maximum rate at which an error-free bit can be transmitted over a noisy channel
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C: the channel capacity in bits per second B: the bandwidth in hertz SNR: the ratio of signal power to noise power

Channel capacity depends on channel bandwidth and system SNR

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Shannons Theorem: Example

For SNR of 0, 10, 20, 30 dB, one can achieve C/B of 1, 3.46, 6.66, 9.97 bps/Hz, respectively Example:
Consider the operation of a modem on an ordinary telephone line. The SNR is usually about 1000. The bandwidth is 3.4 KHz. Therefore: C = 3400 X log2(1 + 1000) = (3400)(9.97) 34 kbps

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Bit Error Rate

BER = Errors / Total number of bits
Error means the reception of a 1 when a 0 was transmitted or vice versa.

Noise is the main factor of BER performance signal path loss, circuit noise,

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Thermal Noise
Thermal Noise
white noise since it contains the same level of power at all frequencies kTB, where
k is the Boltzmanns constant = 1.381e-21 W / K / Hz, T is the absolute temperature in Kelvin, and B is the bandwidth.

At room temperature, T = 290K, the thermal noise power spectral density,

kT = 4.005e-21 W/Hz or 174 dBm/Hz

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Receiver
Receive signal at RF frequencies and signal processing at low frequencies

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Analog section:
signal conditioning, frequency conversion, analog-to-digital conversion

Digital section:
synchronization, frequency correction, decoding
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Receiver Sensitivity
The minimum input signal power needed at receiver input to provide adequate SNR at receiver output to do data demodulation SNR depends on
Received signal power Background thermal noise at antenna (Na) Noise added by the receiver (Nr)

Pmin = SNRmin (Na +Nr)

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Noise Figure
Noise Figure (F) quantifies the increase in noise caused by the noise source in the receiver relative to input noise F = SNRinput/SNRoutput = (Na + Nr)/Na

Pmin = SNRmin(Na + Nr) = SNRminF Na

Example: if SNRmin = 10 dB, F = 4 dB, BW = 1 MHz Pmin= 10 + 4 -174 + 10log(106) = -100 dBm

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Required Receiver Sensitivity

Transmit power: FCC regulation Path loss

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Receiver sensitivity: govern by standards and applications

Required SNR: depends on BER requirement and modulation scheme Noise floor: thermal noise or transmitter noise limited

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802.15.4: Receiver Noise Figure Calculation

Channel Noise bandwidth is 1.5 MHz Transmit Power is 1mW or 0 dBm Thermal noise floor is 174 dBm/Hz X 1.5 MHz = 112 dBm Total SNR budget is 0 dBm (112 dBm) = 112 dBm To cover ~100 ft. at 2.4 GHz results in a path loss of 40 dB
i.e. Receiver sensitivity is 85 dBm

Required SNR for QPSK is 12.5 dB

802.15.4 packet length is 1Kb Worst packet loss < 1%, (1 BER)1024= 1 1%, BER = 105

Receiver noise figure requirement

NF = Transmit Power Path Loss Required SNR Noise floor = 0 + 112 40 12.5 = 59.5 dB

The design spec is very relaxed Low transmit power enables CMOS single chip solution Low cost and low power!
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Modulation Techniques
Purpose of Modulation?
By modulating the signal onto a much higher carrier frequency, the communication systems can use a much smaller antenna. Also, more robust communication, multiplexing, etc.

Modulation Types
Analog modulation: AM, FM, PM Digital modulation: BPSK, QPSK, BFSK,MSK

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Analog Modulation Amplitude Modulation (AM)

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Amplitude of carrier is modulated by the baseband signal (XBB)

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Analog Modulation: FM

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Baseband signal is applied to control voltage of VCO

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Analog Modulation Pulse Modulation

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Derivative of baseband signal is applied to control voltage of VCO

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Digital Modulation
Advantages over analog modulation
Better noise immunity Easier multiplexing of various forms of information (data, video..) Source coding, security encryption, error correction

Performance Metrics
Power efficiency
A measure of how much signal power should be used to achieve a particular BER for a given modulation scheme Signal energy per bit / noise power spectral density: Eb / N0

Bandwidth efficiency
Ability to accommodate data within a limited bandwidth Throughput data rate per hertz: bps per Hz

Wireless Sensor

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Digital Modulation Techniques

Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK) similar to AM
On-off keying

Frequency Shift Keying (FSK) similar to FM

Binary frequency shift keying (BFSK) 4-level frequency shift keying (4-FSK)

Phase Shift Keying (PSK) similar to PM

Binary phase shift keying (BPSK) Quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK, OQPSK, /4-QPSK) 8-level phase shift keying (8-PSK) 16-level phase shift keying (16-PSK)

Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM)

16-QAM 64-QAM
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Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)

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Advantages
Very simple modulation and demodulation

Disadvantages
High sensitivity to noise Low bandwidth efficiency
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Frequency Shift Keying (FSK)

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BFSK: carrier frequency is shifted between f1 and f2 4-FSK: carrier frequency is shifted on f1, f2, f3 and f4. Better bandwidth efficiency than ASK Simple modulation and demodulation
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Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK)

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Use alternative sine wave phase to encode bits Simple implement, low bandwidth efficiency Very robust, used extensively in satellite communications

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Quadrature Phase Shift Keying

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Multi-level modulation technique: 2 bits per symbol

2 x bandwidth efficiency of BPSK
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QPSK Modulator

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QPSK Time Domain Waveform

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IEEE 802.15.4 Standard

A standard for Low-Rate Wireless Personal Area Network (LR-WPAN).

Provide a standard with ultra-low complexity, cost, and power for low-data-rate wireless connectivity among inexpensive fixed, portable, and moving devices.
The standard only defines the Physical layer (PHY) and Medium Access Layer (MAC). The higher-layer protocols are left to industry and the individual applications. The Zigbee Alliance is an association of companies involved with building higher-layer standards based on IEEE 802.15.4.
Network layer Application support layer Marketing
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Approach for Low Power

Reduce the amount of data transmitted Reduce the transceiver duty cycle and frequency of data transmissions Reduce the frame overhead Reduce complexity Reduce range Implement strict power management mechanisms (power-down and sleep modes)

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Low-Rate WPAN Architecture

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Wireless Sensor Network

Sensor Applications +

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= WSN

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802.15.4 Operating Band

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802.15.4 - Modulation Scheme

2.4 GHz PHY
250 kb/s (4 bits/symbol, 62.5 kBaud) Data modulation is 16-ary orthogonal O-QPSK 16 symbols are ~orthogonal set of 32-chip PN codes

868 MHz/915 MHz PHY

Symbol rate
868 MHz band: 20 kbps (1bit/symbol, 20 Kbaud) 915 MHz band: 40 kbps (1bit/symbol, 40 Kbaud)

Spreading code is 15-chip Data modulation is BPSK

868 MHz: 300 Kchips/s 915 MHz: 600 Kchips/s

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802.15.4 - Coding
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Symbol is transmitted as a series of chips Symbol (k bits) n chips waveform Ensure that there are clear edges, not too far apart so that receiver can stay synchronized with transmitter Differentiate valid symbol from noise
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802.15.4 - PHY Communication Parameters

Transmit power
Capable of at least 0.5 mW

Transmit center frequency tolerance

40 ppm

Receiver sensitivity (packet error rate < 1%)

85 dBm @ 2.4 GHz band 92 dBm @ 868/915 MHz band

Receiver Selectivity
2.4 GHz: 5 MHz channel spacing, 0 dB adjacent channel requirement

Channel Selectivity and Blocking

915 MHz and 2.4 GHz band: 0 dB rejection of interference from adjacent channel 30 dB rejection of interference from alternate channel

Rx Signal Strength Indication Measurements

Packet strength indication Clear channel assessment Dynamic channel selection
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802.15.4 - SNR Requirement

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For QPSK used in 802.15.4 to achieve a BER of 10-5, a SNR of 12.5 dB is needed. For 64-QAM used in 802.11a to achieve the same BER, a SNR of 27 dB is needed! The hardware requirement for 802.15.4 is much more relaxed and therefore can operate at much lower power
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Path Loss
Relationship between received power and transmitted power:

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802.15.4: Measurement Data

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802.15.4: Receiver Noise Figure Calculation

Channel Noise bandwidth is 1.5 MHz Transmit Power is 1mW or 0 dBm Thermal noise floor is 174 dBm/Hz X 1.5 MHz = 112 dBm Total SNR budget is 0 dBm (112 dBm) = 112 dBm To cover ~100 ft. at 2.4 GHz results in a path loss of 40 dB
i.e. Receiver sensitivity is 85 dBm

Required SNR for QPSK is 12.5 dB

802.15.4 packet length is 1Kb Worst packet loss < 1%, (1 BER)1024= 1 1%, BER = 105

Receiver noise figure requirement

NF = Transmit Power Path Loss Required SNR Noise floor = 0 + 112 40 12.5 = 59.5 dB

The design spec is very relaxed Low transmit power enables CMOS single chip solution Low cost and low power!
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802.15.4: PHY Hardware Implementation

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802.15.4 Packet Structure

PHY Packet Fields
Preamble (32 bits): synchronization
All set to binary zero, allows sufficient number of bits to achieve synchronization

Start of Packet Delimiter (8 bits)

0xe6, allows receiver to establish the beginning of the packet in the stream of bits

PHY Header (8 bits)

MSB reserved, remaining bits used to designate frame length information

PSDU (0 to 1016 bits): data field

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Summary of Todays Lecture

Physical Layer for Wireless Communications
802.11, Bluetooth and Zigbee

Fundamentals of RF communications (contd)

Basic concepts Modulation techniques

802.15 Standard
Overview

Physical Layer of 802.15.4

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Detailed Info

Duplexing - Principles
FDD (Frequency Division Duplexing )
Uses One Frequency for the DownLink, and a Second Frequency for the UpLink.

TDD (Time Division Duplexing) Uses the same timeslot for the Downlink and the Uplink. In any configuration the access method is OFDMA/TDMA

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OFDMA-TDMA Principles
Using OFDMA/TDMA, Sub Channels are allocated in the Frequency Domain, and OFDM Symbols allocated in the Time Domain

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Downlink OFDMA Symbol

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PHY Services
The PHY layer provides an interface between the physical radio channel and the MAC sublayer through the use of two services
PHY data service
Accessed by PHY layer data service access point (PD-SAP)

PHY management service

Accessed by PHY layer management entity service access point (PLME-SAP)

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PHY Data Service (PD-DATA)

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PHY Management Service Primitives

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Receiver NF Calculation Example: 802.11a

FCC limits the PSD in 5 GHz to 2.5 mW/MHz Channel bandwidth is 16 MHz Transmit Power is 40 mW or 16 dBm Thermal noise floor is 174 dBm/Hz X 16 MHz = 102 dBm Total SNR budget is 16 dBm (102 dBm) = 118 dBm To cover ~300 ft. at 5 GHz results in a path loss of 86 dB
i.e. Receiver sensitivity is 70 dBm (802.11a specification is 65 dBm)

Required SNR for 64 QAM (54Mbps) is 27 dB

802.11a packet length is 8 kb Worst packet loss < 10%, (1 BER)8000= 1 10%, BER = 105

Receiver noise figure requirement

NF = Transmit Power Path Loss Required SNR Noise floor = 16 + 102 86 27 = 5 dB
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