TEB 2063: WIRELESS TECHNOLOGY

Extended Assignment

Student: Maralgul Korpeyeva

ID: 19000145

Question 1.a) How the transmission quality from the Perseverance Rover is affected
during the long-distance transmissions.

Perseverance, nicknamed Percy, is a small-sized Mars rover designed to explore the

Mars as part of NASA’s Mars 2020 mission. It was launched on July 30, 2020, and
successfully landed on Mars on February 18, 2021. Its main job:
• Searching for livability: recognize past environments that were capable of
supporting microbial life
• Seeking biosignatures: seek signs of possible past microbial life.
• Gathering samples: gather center stone and soil for testing.
• Preparing for people: test oxygen production from the Martian atmosphere.

Space communications consist of two things, which are a transmitter and a receiver.
A transmitter encodes a message onto electromagnetic waves through modulation,
which changes properties of the wave to represent the data. These waves flow
through space toward the receiver. The receiver collects the electromagnetic waves
and demodulates them, decoding the sender’s message.
The Perseverance rover has three communication antennas. They serve as both its
"voice" and its "ears." Having multiple antennas provides operational flexibility and
back-up options. Antennas on rover deck are:
• Ultra-High Frequency Antenna
• X-band High-Gain Antenna
• X-band Low-Gain Antenna
X-Band High-Gain Antenna allows the beam to focus, allowing higher data rates. Its
radio frequency is 7-8 gigahertz and transmission rate is 800/3000 bit per second. X-
band Low-Gain Antenna is primarily used for receiving signals. It is omnidirectional.
As communication transmissions travel over long distances or through the
atmosphere, the quality of their data can deteriorate, corrupting the message.
Radiation from other missions, the Sun, or other celestial bodies can also interfere
with the quality of transmissions.
It generally takes about 5 to 20 minutes for a radio signal to travel the distance
between Mars and Earth, depending on planet positions and other various factors.
But due to long distance transmissions between Mars and Earth the quality of the
transmission may be low. That’s why NASA’s engineers decided to use Mars orbiters
to transmit messages. It is is better because they are much closer to Perseverance
than the Deep Space Network (DSN) antennas on Earth. Perseverance Rover can
achieve high data rates of up to 2 megabits per second on the relatively short-
distance relay link to the orbiters overhead. The orbiters then use their much larger
antennas and transmitters to send that data on the long-distance back to Earth.
In other words, frequently the rover uses its UHF antenna (about 400 megahertz)
to communicate with Earth through NASA's orbiters around Mars. Because the rover
and orbiter antennas are within close range of each other, they may act a little like
walky-talkies compared to the long-range telecommunications with Earth provided by
the low-gain and high-gain antennas. And it results in better data transmission.

Question 1.b) Synthesize strategies to sense transmission errors and correct

erroneous bits via high performance error correction method.

Previously, upon transmission to Earth, the data were each split into parts and
packaged inside telemetry packets. Each packet was identified according to the type
of data it carried, plus additional information required for data product reconstruction
on the ground. The Ground Data Subsystem was capable of handling some bit level
errors that were due to transmission noise. When such corrections were not
possible, or when data were missing, the meta‐file was tagged with information
flagging the condition. In most cases, corrupt or partial data products were
retransmitted and when new versions were available, they were used to overwrite
the older, less complete versions on the GDS.

Nowadays, to make sure that mission operations centers receive accurate data,
NASA uses methods of error detection and correction. Methods of error correction
include computer algorithms that interpret noisy transmissions as usable data.

One of the main purposes of the Perseverance Rover mission was to take pictures of
Mars. Before these pictures were transmitted to Earth they had to be compressed.
The image compression technique primarily used is called The ICER Progressive
Wavelet Image Compression. In such a compression a low-quality approximation of
the picture is first transmitted. Afterwards bits are transmitted in such a way that the
quality of the picture are gradually improved. When all bits are transmitted the
reconstructed picture equals the original picture.Designed for primary use in
transmitting scientific image data from distant spacecraft to Earth, ICER incorporates
an error-containment scheme that limits the adverse effects of loss of data and is
well suited to the data packets transmitted by deep-space probes. The error-
containment scheme includes utilization of the algorithm described as "Partitioning a
Gridded Rectangle Into Smaller Rectangles" .

Another error detection and correction method for Perseverance Rover could be
Rover’s coding system which consisted of two combined] error correcting codes; a
Reed-Solomon code and a Convolutional code. Convolutional codes are excellent
for correcting single bit errors (errors which most often occurs from interference in
deep space). Unfortunately the decoding of convolutional codes often results in a run
of consecutive errors, so-called burst errors. Fortunately Reed-Solomon codes are
excellent in correcting exactly burst errors, hence the concatenated system. The
reason for first encoding the data with the Reed-Solomon code and then the
convolutional code is that the decoding procedure must be the reverse of the
encoding procedure. Additionally, Block interleaving is a technique used to ensure
that the burst errors from the convolutional decoding are no more severe than what
the Reed-Solomon decoder can handle.
Question 2. 5G & 6G relation, comparison, advantages, applications and limitations.

5G is the 5th generation mobile network. 5G wireless technology is meant to deliver

higher multi-Gbps peak data speeds, ultra-low latency, more reliability, massive
network capacity, increased availability, and a more uniform user experience to more
users. 5G will bring wider bandwidths by expanding the usage of spectrum
resources. 5G can operate in both lower bands (e.g., sub-6 GHz) as well as
mmWave (e.g., 24 GHz and up).

6G will be the sixth generation of wide-area wireless technology, the successor

to 5G cellular technology. There is a lot of speculations going on around 6G even
though it doesn't exist yet. Like its predecessors, 6G networks will probably be
broadband cellular networks, in which the service area is divided into small
geographical areas called cells.It is speculated that 6G networks will be able to use
higher frequencies than 5G networks and provide substantially higher capacity and
much lower latency.

The relation between 5G and 6G is that 6G mobile communications technology will

build on that already established for 5G. Some of the existing new technologies will
be further developed for 6G. For example,

• Millimeter wave technology – mmW will be further developed, by using much

higher frequencies in frequency spectrum, possibly extending into the
TeraHertz.

• Greater MIMO: currently the numbers of antennas is limited. But with bigger
frequencies many tens of antennas could be used on a single equipment.

• Dense networks Reducing the size of cells provides a much more overall
effective use of the available spectrum.

It is probably a little early to give an exact comparison of two, but I will base my
statements on predictions made by scientists:
5G 6G
Frequency Sub 6 GHz and above 95GHz to 3 THz
24.2 GHz
Data Rate 1 Gbps to 20 Gbps 1 Tbps

Latency 5 ms (Radio : 1 msec) < 1 ms (Radio : 0.1 msec)

Traffic Capacity 10 Mbps/m2 1 to 10 Gbps/m2
In 5G system end-user devices connect to base stations that connect to a backbone.
Maybe 6G could use devices as boosters for one another's data so that every device
would extend coverage as well as using it.

Advantages of 5G:
• Greater speed in transmissions
• Lower latency
• Greater capacity of remote execution
• Greater number of connected devices
• Network slicing
• Providing more adjusted connectivity to concrete needs.

Advantages of 6G:
• Will offer very high data rate (Tb/sec) and very low latency (sub-ms).
• Will use Visible lights which leverage benefits of LEDs such as illumination
and high-speed data communication.
• Will use THz frequencies, which easily absorbs moisture in the air hence it is
useful for high speed short range wireless communications
• Will be designed to target indoor coverage efficiently
• Will support higher number of mobile connections (greater than 5G)
• Mobile Edge Computing will be built into the network.
• Flexible duplex, which willenable simultaneous transmission and reception on
the same channel.

Application of 5G:

5G helps to eliminate the biggest limitation od IoT expansion, by giving devices real-
time ability to sense and respond. Because of the vastly increased network capacity,
it will also be used in Mobile Services to reduce slowdowns and provide high-
definition streaming. Additionally, it will provide better connectivity for Edge
Computing, consequently industries will be able to scale up their data usage and
process it instantly and autonomously.

There is various application of 5G technologies in Industries. For instance,

Healthcare (enable doctors and patients to stay more connected than ever),
Retail(manage inventory and stocking in real time), Logistics (navigation could
potentially be powered with augmented reality system), Manufacturing (increase
control and analyze industrial processes), Agriculture(will make use of more data
and less chemicals).
Further, 5G is used in the military. It improves intelligence, surveillance, and
reconnaissance (ISR) systems and processing; enable new methods of command
and control.

Applications of 6G:

We don't know, because it doesn't exist. However, there are some ideas starting to
swirl around that suggest how it might eventually work. 6G networks will likely
support applications far beyond anything seen so far in mobile scenario, such
as Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR),instant communications, pervasive
intelligence,, spectrum sharing, infrastructure sharing, and intelligent automated
management underpinned by mobile edge computing, artificial intelligence and
blockchain technologies. Working in conjunction with artificial intelligence (AI), the
computational infrastructure of 6G will be able to autonomously determine the best
location for computing to occur; this includes decisions about data storage,
processing and sharing.

VR/AR applications facilitate augmented reality experience and create tremendous

new opportunities in industries including education, business, healthcare, and
entertainment, etc. Many VR/AR applications involve streaming of 360 degree video
scenes ,which requires much higher network bandwidth and much lower packet
delivery latency.

Some of the 6G services will include holographic communications, high precision

manufacturing, new technologies such as sub-THz or VLC (Visible Light
Communications), 3D coverage framework, terrestrial and aerial radio APs to
provide cloud functionalities and so on.

Limitations of 5G:
• Are able to only travel in short distances
• Obstructions (tree, buildings, walls and etc.) can impact connectivity
• Lack of widespread coverage
• The battery on the phone will drain fast
• 2G,3G is used for voice calls, but there is no such standard for 5G for voice
calls till now, there are also limited VoLTE phones in world.
• Hight cost

Limitations of 6G:
Currently, I cannot really identify the future limitations of 6G. But it is clear that if there
are shortfalls in 5G, then these will be included in the 6G proposals. The format for 6G
will depend on how 5G develops and where its shortfalls appear to be.
In conclusion, there are numerous challenges with constructing of 6G. Main is that
scientists trying to come up with a way to transmit data THz range. These waves are
extremely tiny and fragile. Also, we don't have semiconductor materials that can use
multi-THz frequencies, it may require enormous arrays of extremely tiny antennas. As
per predictions, 6G will only be created in 2030 or later.