National university of science and technology

FACULTY OF INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY

B.ENG (HONS) TELECOMMUNICATIONS ENGINEERING

NAME : TENDAI B. CHINGWENA

STUDENT NO. : 174743T
MODULE CODE: TCL 2102
LECTURER : MR MURAUZI

QUESTIONS:
1a.) Briefly explain radio channel characterization in mobile communication.
b.) Discuss the issues of Quality of Service in mobile communication.
1a.) As a consequence of the growing interest in wireless communications systems,
much effort is being devoted to the channel characterization and modelling. This is
obvious since the performance depends fundamentally on the channels under
consideration, so a communication system design must be preceded by the study
of channel characteristics. Wireless communication channels are usually described
by considering three separable phenomena, namely, path loss, shadowing, and
multipath fading. Various efforts to characterize such aspects of wireless
communication channels are then done. In densely built-up areas, the transmitted
signal from the base station mostly arrives at the mobile station as a multitude of
partial waves from different directions. This is known as multipath propagation.
This effect gives rise to multipath fading which can cause distortion to the radio
signal. This occurs when various paths that can be taken by the signals vary in
length such that the signal transmitted at a particular instance will arrive at the
receiver over a spread of times. This can cause problems with phase distortion and
inter-symbol interference when data transmissions are made. In other words, this
leads to the received signal strength decreasing and sometimes unable to be
recognized. In order to nullify this effect, it may be necessary to incorporate
features within the radio communications system that enables the effects of these
problems to be minimized. So, characterization and modelling of wireless channel
is highly important.
Multipath Fading Characterization.
Multipath fading is characterized by two distinct mechanisms which are time
dispersion and frequency dispersion. In time dispersion, when a signal is
transmitted, this signal can suffer a distortion caused by reflections and scattered
propagation paths in the radio channel, and these phenomenons cause an identical
signal to arrive at different times at its destination. These different times are due
that to the signal arrives via multiple paths and in different incident angles. The
time difference between the arrival moment of the first multipath component and
the last one is called delay spread. In order to compare different multipath channels
and to develop some general design guidelines for wireless systems, some
parameters are used to quantify the multipath channel. Some of these multipath
parameters are the mean excess delay, rms delay spread, and maximum excess
delay, and can be determined from a power delay profile. However, the mean
excess delay and the rms delay spread are frequently used to quantify the time
dispersive properties of wide band multipath channels. The Mean Excess Delay is
the first moment of the power delay profile (PDP) and is defined by RMS Delay
Spread. The root-mean-square (RMS) delay spread is probably the most important
single measure for the delay time extent of a multipath radio channel. This
parameter calculates the standard deviation value of the delay of reflections,
weighted proportional to the energy in the reflected waves. This parameter can be
considered like the square root of the second central moment of the power delay
profile and is further defined by Maximum Excess Delay (X dB). The maximum
excess delay (X dB) of the power delay profile is defined as the time delay value
after which the multipath energy falls to X dB below the maximum multipath
energy (not necessarily belonging to the first arriving component). It is also called
excess delay spread, but in all cases must be specified with a threshold that relates
the multipath noise floor to the maximum received multipath component. The
values of these time dispersion parameters also depend on the noise threshold
used to process (P), and if this noise is set too low, then the noise will be processed
as multipath and thus causing the parameters to be higher. The other parameter is
an environment parameter called Coherence Bandwidth (BC). Coherence
bandwidth is a statistical measure of the range of frequencies over which the
channel can be considered “flat”. The coherence bandwidth of the channel gives a
good indication about the frequency variations(dispersion) of the channel in
relation to the bandwidth of the transmitted signal. We can have two different
cases, depending on this bandwidth. If a signal with a bandwidth larger than BC is
transmitted through the channel, it will be subject to frequency selective distortion.
The channel will be, in this case, referred to as a frequency selective fading channel.
However, if the signal transmitted has a bandwidth considerably less than BC, it will
experience amplitude attenuation only with no distortion since the channel
characteristics will be the same all over the spectrum of the signal. In this case the
channel is referred to as a frequency non-selective (flat) fading channel.
Path Loss Characterization.
Path loss describes the variation of the signal strength over large distances on wide
frequency bands. The path loss is usually analyzed with respect to the distance
transmitter and receiver for a narrow frequency band. However, it also depends on
the building density and the heights of base station and mobile station antennas.
The radio signal path loss will determine many elements of the radio
communications system in particular the transmitter power, and the antennas,
especially their gain, height and general location. This is true for whatever
frequency is used. The radio path loss can often be mathematically characterized
with the following equation:
PL = Lo + 10a log10(d)
were Lo is termed the frequency dependent component, the parameter a is called
the “path loss gradient” or exponent and the value of a determines how quickly the
RSS falls with distance.

These calculations are often undertaken when preparing coverage or system

design activities. These depend on a knowledge of the signal propagation
properties. Accordingly, radio path loss calculations are used in many radio and
wireless survey tools for determining signal strength at various locations. These
wireless survey tools are being increasingly used to help determine what radio
signal strengths will be, before installing the equipment. For cellular operator’s
radio coverage surveys are important because the investment in a macro-cell base
station is high. Also, wireless survey tools provide a very valuable service for
applications such as installing wireless LAN systems in large offices and other
centers because they enable problems to be solved before installation, enabling
costs to be considerably reduced. Accordingly, there is an increasing importance
being placed onto wireless survey tools and software. Path Loss Models are
commonly used to estimate link budgets, cell sizes and shapes, capacity, handoff
criteria etc.
Shadowing characterization.
Shadowing is the effect that the received signal power fluctuates due to objects
obstructing the propagation path between transmitter and receiver. These
fluctuations are experienced on local-mean powers, that is, short-term averages to
remove fluctuations due to multipath fading. To deal with this situation, during
radio channel designing, shadowing characterization should be taken into an
account. Shadowing models are used and can allow simple unconstrained analysis
and accurate wireless system planning and performance evaluation. Shadowing
makes practical cell planning and performance complicated. To fully predict local
shadow attenuation, up-to-date and highly detailed terrain data bases are needed.
If one extends the distinction between large-area and small-area shadowing, the
definition of shadowing covers any statistical fluctuation of the received local-mean
power about a certain area-mean power, with the latter determined by
(predictable) large-scale mechanisms. Multipath propagation is separated from
shadow fluctuations by considering the local-mean powers. That is, the standard
deviation of the shadowing will depend on the geographical resolution of the
estimate of the area-mean power. A propagation model which ignores specific
terrain data produces about 12 dB of shadowing. On the other hand, prediction
methods using topographical data bases with unlimited resolution can, at least in
theory, achieve a standard deviation of 0 dB. Thus, the standard deviation is a
measure of the impreciseness of the terrain description.
b.) ln mobile communication, Quality of Service (QoS) is a measure of the network
performance that reflects the network’s transmission quality and service
availability. QoS controls and manages network resources by setting priorities for
specific types of data on the network. Enterprise networks need to provide
predictable and measurable services as applications such as voice, video and delay-
sensitive data traverse the network. Organizations use QoS to meet the traffic
requirements of sensitive applications, such as real-time voice and video, and to
prevent the degradation of quality caused by packet loss, delay and jitter.
Organizations can achieve QoS by using certain tools and techniques, such as jitter
buffer, traffic shaping and traffic policy. In traffic policy, the transmission rates are
limited, thereby guaranteeing a certain amount of bandwidth will be available to
applications while traffic shaping, techniques to reserve bandwidth for applications
but not guarantee its availability are employed. There are many impediments to
providing service guarantees in a network. Following are some of the challenges
present in both wired and wireless networks. The primary challenge in providing
QoS is network congestion and flow control. When a network is congested, the end-
to-end delay increases. So, flow control is required to minimize congestion where
the flow can be controlled by maintaining a queue till congestion gets reduced. This
however leads to an increase in delay and if this delay crosses timeout it may incur
huge packet losses. Evidently, this flow technique can only be used in case the
processing delay and packet loss are not the desired QoS parameters. Otherwise
the flow can be controlled by not admitting a new call request in case the desired
QoS is not possible to satisfy. However, such process of flow control increases call
block and can be used in case the call block is not the desired QoS. Another obstacle
in wireless QoS involves propagation delay. Some wireless networks span distances
that are measured in kilometers. In these networks, propagation delay can be a
tremendous burden to all communication, but especially to communication that
requires a guarantee on total delay. This problem may exist to some extent in
metropolitan area networks (MANs), and it is a significant issue in satellite
communications. The resource management is also another QoS issue in mobile
communication. This is a process of assigning resources to users with different
bandwidth and QoS requirements as well as to provide a guarantee of negotiated
service. Mobile communication systems may connect simultaneously to multiple
BSs using multiple links. The number of BSs and which BS to connect to are function
of the time varying channel, mobility, current bandwidth need and QoS
requirements. When a call is admitted into the network, the resource management
strategy will allow the mobile to configure dynamically its connections in such a
way to minimize call dropping probability, maximize signal quality and to increase
channel resource utilization efficiency. The other important issue of QoS to take
note of in mobile communication is Admission Control, the decision process to
whether or not to grant access to specific requirements offered by the users. A
good admission control scheme should admit as many users as possible to
maximize revenue of the system while maintaining the quality of services offered.
For example, a user’s access to a cellular communication system consists of two
stages; call set up and call maintenance. During the call set up stage, the system
has to decide if there is sufficient resource to accommodate the requesting user.
Once the system grants access to the user, it enters the call maintenance stage
during which it is the responsibility of the system to provide acceptable service
quality. Next is the issue of QoS is user mobility. In mobile communication eras
users must get a convenient access to the services needed at any given situation.
User mobility has become an important aspect in the design of wireless
communication systems. It can be difficult to maintain service guarantees in a
network if the nodes involved are mobile. For example, in a scheme involving
resource reservation, if the sender moves, a new route to the destination must be
established. The possibility exists that no route to the destination exists that can
provide the previous level of service guarantees, so the connection may be dropped
or degraded to a lower level of service. A similar problem can occur if a node along
the route from sender to receiver moves (mobility of a node). The nodes move
independently and randomly at any direction and speed, the topology information
has to be updated frequently as well, so as to provide routing to reach the final
destination. This result in again less packet delivery ratio. All these 2 cases are
bound to affect the QoS in mobile communication system. Limited power supply is
another issue of QoS. In mobile communication systems, power is a fundamental
resource in wireless communication systems. The mobile nodes are generally
inhibited by limited power supply compared to the nodes in the wired networks.
Offering QoS to the network absorb more power because of overhead from node
which may drain the node’s power quickly. Like for existing frequency division
multiple access/time division multiple access (FDMA/TDMA) systems, cell planning
is based on the worst-case scenario where users at the cell boundary can still have
acceptable signal quality. Such an arrangement is simple but inefficient, because a
user close to BS transmits at unnecessarily high-power levels, which not only results
in high co-channel interference, but also reduces the lifetime of the battery in the
mobile unit. The dynamic adjustment of transmitted power levels can be done to
provide adequate quality to each user without resulting in unnecessary
interference to other users. Security can be considered as an important QoS
attribute in mobile communication systems. Without offering a satisfactory
security provision, unauthorized accesses and usages may infringe the QoS
negotiations. The nature of transmission of packets in the network may lead to
more security exposures. Hence, designing a more security-aware routing
algorithms should be done in these mobile communication systems. Traffic
scheduling is also another issue. Future wireless multimedia networks will have a
mixture of different traffic classes each has its own QoS requirements. Scheduling
of the traffic is required to accommodate such heterogeneous and burst
multimedia traffic flows efficiently.