Stanford University Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Communication - 2
AA236A
24 October 2007

James Cutler
http://ssdl.stanford.edu/

Copyright 2007, Duplication of material for commercial without written permission is

prohibited.

Stanford University Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Announcements

Stanford University Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Communication Subsystem

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Bits to RF…RF to bits?

• Enter the modem…
– Modulator and demodulator.

1 0 1 1 0 0 1
• Modulation
– Modifies a carrier frequency (RF signal) with encoded digital
information.

• Demodulation
– Measures the received carrier signal (RF signal) and
decodes the digital information.

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US Frequency Allocations

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70 cm Band (440MHz)

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2m Band (140MHz)

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SatCom Bands

Table 13-12

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Other Interesting Bands

• We mentioned amateur bands.
– Rules governing amateur use
• For example, no encryption on data
– It’s good to be a HAM (take the test, technician no code).
– Need to have an amateur use

• Industrial, Scientific, and Medical (ISM) bands

– 900 MHz, 1.8 GHz, 2.4 GHz, 5.8 GHz
– Originally reserved internationally for non-commercial use of RF
– Recently shared with license-free error-tolerant communications
applications (ie wireless LANs)

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Bandwidth (BW)
• In networking:
– Bandwidth is the data rate.
– How fast can we move bits? 100
Mbps, 1Gbps.

• In radio communication:
– BW is the amount of spectrum used
to transmit data.
– What is the frequency range of your
carrier signal?

• Fast signals have high bandwidth

• Slow signals have low bandwidth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Bandwidth.svg

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Spectrum Analyzer and Bandwidth

http://www.projects.ncassr.org/sdr/spectrum_analyzer/index.html

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RF Channel Capacity
• Is there a limit to how much we can send?
– YES! – Claude Shannon, 1948
– Invention of information theory

–“A Mathematical Theory of

Communication”, Bell System Journal,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannons_theory 1948

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Shannon Capacity

S
C = BW log 2 (1 + )
N
• C – channel capacity (bps)
• B – bandwidth in HZ
• S – signal power over bandwidth
• N – noise power over bandwidth

http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scots_Guide/iandm/part8/page1.html

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Example 1
• Voice channel – telephony
– Bandwidth = 3.3KHz
– SNR is 100 ( in dB? )

3300 log 2 (1 + 100) = 21.97 Kbps

Stanford University Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Example 2
• DSL
– Bandwidth ~ 1MHz
– SNR is 20dB

106 log 2 (1 + 100) = 6.6 Mbps

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Communication Subsystem

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AM – Amplitude Modulation

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Digital Modulation Techniques

• OOK - On/Off Keying
• PSK - Phase Shift Keying
• FSK - Frequency Shift Keying
• MSK - Minimum Shift Keying

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OOK – On-Off Keying

How fast can you key the switch?

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Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

http://www.spectrum-soft.com/news/spring98/psk3.gif

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PSK
• Symbols translated into phase shifts:
– BPSK (binary): 0 or 1 BPSK
– QPSK (quadrature): 00, 01, 10, 11
BW = R
• Bandwidth is equal to symbol rate.

• Example applications QPSK

– Wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11b,etc)
– Many RFID systems
BW = R/2
– Bluetooth 2

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QPSK Encoder Example

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FM – Frequency Modulation

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FSK – Frequency Shift Keying

1 0 1 0 1 0

fc1 fc2

BW = ~2R

http://www-personal.engin.umd.umich.edu/~richarpc/ch2_5_modems.ppt

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Communication Subsystem

How much data?

Stanford University Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Common Parameters
• Bandwidth of the channel (Hz)
• Signal Power
S
• Noise Power C=B W log 2 (1 + )
N
Eb PLl Gt Ls La Gr
= = SNR
No kTs R
The Link Equation

E b " N o = P + Ll + Gt + Ls + La + Gr + 228.6 "10logTs "10log R

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How good is our communication system?

• We can estimate and measure SNR.
– But this is analog
– What does this mean in the digital world?

• What is the bit error rate (BER)?

– How often do we see errors in our data?
– Combine SNR, noise model, modulation, and forward error correction to get
BER.

• Typical BER
– Good link: 10-9 or 10-10
– Let’s say we have 10-5
• 1 error every 100000 bits
• At 9600bps, that’s 1 error every 10s
• At 1200bps, that’s 1 error every 83s.

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PSK BERs

Gaussian white noise

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Modulation and BER

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Multiple Access Channels

• How do we use a radio link for more than one
communicating node?

– FDMA – Frequency Division Multiple Access

– TDMA – Time Division Multiple Access.

– CDMA – Code Division Multiple Access

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AA236 Guidelines
• Traditional use of FSK (AFSK/GMSK)
– 1200 or 9600 bps
– HAM radio compatible

• Antenna tuning and matching work

• Power constraints
– 1W on satellite

• Link margin VERY VERY important for our missions

– Balloon mission
– 1U Cubesat, Katysat estimated on 3dB of margin
– Link budget page empty

• Much room (and need) for innovation

– Better antennas
– Better radios/modems

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