Advantageous solution for wireless personal area network using

ultra-wideband technology (uwb)

Part of the UWB revolution
Author: Dr Gurudutt Sahni

[May. 07, 2007]

Ultra-wideband (UWB) technology has gone through some
revolutionary changes this year, including the legalization of the
technology in the US for imaging systems, vehicular radar
systems, and communications and measurement systems.

The allocation of 7.5 GHz worth of new unlicensed spectrum that can be used for
communications and measurement techniques, in particular, has sparked a renewed
interest in both research and development of UWB technology in industry,
universities, and government offices. However, a significant number of challenges
remain for the technology to become ubiquitous. In this paper, a brief status of the
UWB technology will be presented, including international regulatory and standards
that are currently underway.

Then, some recent results on UWB channel modeling efforts for the indoor multipath
channel are presented, which are critical when designing a high-rate UWB
implementation. Finally, the protocol used in UWB technology and its long list of
applications. Also paper is concern about the disadvantages of this technology.

Ultra-wideband technology is a wireless transmission scheme that occupies a

bandwidth of more than 25 % of a center frequency or more than 1.5 GHz. UWB
technology can bring the mobility of wireless communications to high-speed
interconnects in devices throughout the digital home and office.

Designed for short-range, wireless personal area networks (WPANs), UWB is a

technology that enables wireless connection of multiple devices for transmission of
video, audio and other high-bandwidth data.UWB, short-range radio technology,
complements other longer range radio technologies such as WiFi, WiMAX, and
cellular wide area communications. Its use will be to relay data from a host device to
other devices in the immediate area (up to 10 meters or 30 feet).

A UWB transmitter works by sending billions of pulses across a very wide spectrum
of frequencies several GHz in bandwidth. The corresponding receiver then translates
the pulses into data by listening to a familiar pulse sequence sent by the transmitter.
Ultra Wideband (UWB) systems transmit signals across a much wider frequency than
conventional systems and are usually very difficult to detect. The amount of spectrum
occupied by a UWB signal, i.e. the bandwidth of the UWB signal is at least 25% of
the center frequency. Thus, UWB's combination of broader spectrum and lower power
improves speed and reduces interference with other wireless spectra.

Why USB vs. Other Technologies?

WiFi
WiFi is an infrastructure-oriented technology and therefore has difficulty
communicating peer to peer. Also it was not designed for streaming audio and video.
The IEEE standards 802.11b and 802.11g are used, both operates in the noisy 2.4 GHz
ISM band and are subject to interference. Transfer rate is slower with a top rate of
54Mbps.

Bluetooth
It was designed as a low power technology just to cut down the power requirements
of the wired technologies. Still it consumes 50x more power as compared to UWB.
The recent version of Bluetooth supports up to a maximum of 12Mbps that is very
low as compare to UWB. It is also having problem of interference as it uses same
band as that of WiFi system.

UWB Technology
A UWB signal centered at 2 GHz would have a minimum bandwidth of 500 MHz and
the minimum bandwidth of a UWB signal centered at 4 GHz would be 1 GHz. The
most common technique for generating a UWB signal is to transmit pulses with
durations less than 1 nanosecond. A traditional UWB transmitter works by sending
billions of pulses across a very wide spectrum of frequency several GHz in
bandwidth.

The corresponding receiver then translates the pulses into data by listening for a
familiar pulse sequence sent by the transmitter. Specifically, UWB is defined as any
radio technology having a spectrum that occupies a bandwidth greater than 20 percent
of the center frequency, or a bandwidth of at least 500 MHz.The MultiBand OFDM
approach allows for good coexistence with narrowband systems such as 802.11a,
adaptation to different regulatory environments, future scalability and backward
compatibility. This design allows the technology to comply with local regulations by
dynamically turning off sub bands and individual OFDM tones to comply with local
rules of operation on allocated spectrum.

With the formation of the MultiBand OFDM Alliance (MBOA) in June 2003, OFDM
for each sub band was added to the initial multiband approach in order to develop the
best technical solution for UWB. To date, the MultiBand OFDM Alliance has more
than 60 participants (and growing) that support a single technical proposal for
UWB.In the MultiBand OFDM approach, the available spectrum of 7.5 GHz is
divided into several 528-MHz bands.

This allows the selective implementation of bands at certain frequency ranges while
leaving other parts of the spectrum unused. The dynamic ability of the radio to
operate in certain areas of the spectrum is important because it can adapt to regulatory
constraints imposed by governments around the world.

The band plan for the MBOA proposal has five logical channels. Channel 1, which
contains the first three bands, is mandatory for all UWB devices and radios. Multiple
groups of bands enable multiple modes of operation for MultiBand OFDM devices.

In the current MultiBand OFDM Alliance's proposal, bands 1-3 are used for Mode 1
devices (mandatory mode), while the other remaining channels (2-5) are optional.
There are up to four time-frequency codes per channel, thus allowing for a total of 20
piconets with the current MBOA proposal. In addition, the proposal also allows
flexibility to avoid channel 2 when and if U-NII (Unlicensed-National Information
Infrastructure) interference, such as from 802.11a, is present.

OFDM Modulation
The information transmitted on each band is modulated using OFDM. OFDM
distributes the data over a large number of carriers that are spaced apart at precise
frequencies. This spacing provides the orthogonality in this technique, which prevents
the demodulators from seeing frequencies other than their own. The benefits of
OFDM are high-spectral efficiency, resiliency to RF interference, and lower multipath
distortion.
By using OFDM modulation techniques coupled with multibanding, it becomes easier
to collect multipath energy using a single RF chain and allows the receiver to deal
with narrowband interference without having to sacrifice sub bands or data rate.
These advantages relate to the ability to turn off individual tones and also easily
recover damaged tones through the use of forward error-correction coding. In this
system Pulse position modulation is the modulation scheme used to distinguish the
transmission of a digital '1' from a digital '0'.

At the receiver the received signal is correlated with a template signal over the
duration of pulse producing an output. This output is then compared to zero and from
this it is determined whether a ‘0’ or a ‘1’ was transmitted.

Protocol Used
Ultra-Wideband (UWB) solution provides full wireless connectivity implementing
direct sequence ultra-wideband (DS-UWB) and the IEEE 802.15.3 media access
control (MAC) protocol. The chipset delivers more than 110 Mbps data transfer rate
supporting applications such as streaming video, streaming audio, and high-rate data
transfer at very low levels of power consumption.

Wider Applications of UWB Technology

The concept of a UWB radio spans many different applications and industries and has
been coined the "common UWB radio platform." The UWB radio, along with the
convergence layer, becomes the underlying transport mechanism for different
applications, some of which are currently only wired.

Some of the more notable applications that would operate on top of the common
UWB platform would be wireless universal serial bus (WUSB), IEEE 1394, the next
generation of Bluetooth, and Universal Plug and Play (UPnP). You can see a diagram
of this vision in Fig below. This concept has many potential applications since it
creates the first high-speed wireless interconnects. UWB technology offers a
combination of performance and ease of use unparalleled by other interconnects
options available.

Presently, wired USB has significant market segment share as the cable interconnect
of choice for the PC platform. But the need for the cable itself points to convenience
and usability challenges for users. By unleashing peripheral devices from the PC
while still providing the performance users have come to expect from wired USB
connections, wireless USB running on ultra wideband promises to gain significant
volume in the PC peripheral interconnect market segment.

An example application for UWB would be bringing a mobile device like a portable
media player (PMP) in proximity to a content source like a PC, laptop, or external
hard disk drive. Once authentication and authorization is established, the device and
PC can perform bulk data transfer of video files onto the PMP for later vie wing.
Within the consumer electronics industry, there is demand for wirelessly connecting
various devices such as DVDs, HDTVs, set-top boxes (STBs), PVRs, stereos,
camcorders, digital cameras, and other CE devices.Wireless ease of use and data
transfer performance is a key factor for adoption in this category.

For example, wireless

connectivity would be ideal for a wall-mounted plasma display where, for aesthetic
reasons, users prefer not to have cables from an STB or Entertainment PC visible. A
variation on this usage model is the ability to stream content to multiple devices
simultaneously. This would allow picture-in-picture functionality or viewing of the
same or different content on multiple viewing devices.

Device Association and Security

WUSB security will ensure the same level of security as wired USB. Connection-
level security between devices will ensure that the appropriate device is associated
and authenticated before operation of the device is permitted. Higher levels of
security involving encryption should be implemented at the application level.
Processing overhead supporting security should not impose noticeable performance
impacts or add device.

One of the primary objectives when implementing a wireless interconnects is that it is

easy to install and use. Wired connections provide the user with implied expectations,
that is that the device is connected as specified by the user when they install the wire.
When the wire is installed, the user has basic expectations and when these
expectations do not take place (plug does not fit), there is a known recourse.

Wireless connections, on the other hand, due to environmental characteristics, may

establish connection paths that are not obvious. In fact, it may not be obvious when a
device is connected.

So WUSB devices installed for the first time should automatically install drivers,
security features, and so on and associate with systems that they can interact with. The
concepts of 'turn on and use it' with an easy setup procedure will be employed.

Ultra Wideband Advantages

Extremely difficult to intercept

-Short pulse excitation generates wideband spectra low energy densities
-Low energy density also minimizes interference to other services

Multipath immunity
Time-gated detector can excise delayed returns – time separation

Commonality of signal generation and processing architectures

-Communications
-LPI/D, High Data Rates, Multipath Tolerance
-Radar
-Inherent high precision – sub-centimeter ranging
-Wideband excitation for detection of complex, low RCS targets
-Geolocation/Positioning
-Sub-centimeter resolution using pulse leading edge detection
Low Cost
-Nearly “all-digital” architecture
-Ideal for microminiaturization into a chipset
-Frequency diversity with minimal hardware modifications

UWB Applications
Tactical Handheld & Network LPI/D Radios
Non-LOS LPI/D Groundwave
Communications
LPI/D Altimeter/Obstacle Avoidance Radar
Intrusion Detection Radars
Precision Geolocation Systems
Proximity Fuzes
LPI/D Wireless Interc
High Speed (20+ Mb/s) WLANs on Systems
Altimeter/Obstacle Avoidance Radars (commercial aviation)
Collision Avoidance Sensors
Tags (Intelligent Transportation Systems, Electronic Signs, Smart Appliances)
Industrial RF Monitoring Systems

Disadvantages
The major problem is possible interference with global positioning satellite (GPS) as
it has a large number of users. It is also seen as a threat to aircraft guidance system
and also to astronomy as the equipment used are very sensitive to interference.

Conclusion
UWB is in early stages of devlopements. It is proving its worth in various fields with
advantages like high bit rate, multimedia connectivity to wireless personal area
network. World is on the verge of freedom from wires. UWB technology offers a
solution for band-width, cost, power consumption, and size requirements of next
generation consumer electronics.
A number of UWB components and system are in testing phase and will be releasing
in near future. UWB has been redefined as a high data rate (480+ Mbps), short-range
(up to 20 meters) technology that specifically addresses emerging applications in the
consumer electronics, personal computing and mobile device markets. When
compared to other existing and nascent technologies capable of providing wireless
connectivity, the performance benefits of UWB are compelling.

References
[1]. Robert Tseng, Jacob Kuo. “Ultra wideband Technology (UWB), EE206A Spring
2002
[2] M.Z. Win, “Ultra-Wide Bandwidth Spread Spectrum Tech- sis, Electrical
Engineering, University of Southern California,
[3].www.intel.com/technology/comms/uwb
[4]. www.palowireless.com/uwb/tutorials.asp
[5]. www.ultrawidebandplanet.com/technology/
[6]. www.multispectral.com/history.html

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