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Prof. B M A Rahman
Professor of Photonics
Office: C118 Telephone: 020-7040-8123
Email: B.M.A.Rahman@city.ac.uk
 Science ↓
 Engineering ↓
 Civil Engineering ↓
 Electrical Engineering ↓
 Electronics ↓
 Photonics ↓
 →Lasers, optical fibres, CD, DVD, LED, LCD, Flat screen TV,
sensors, material processing, etc.

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COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS
 Ch1: Introduction
 Ch2: Analogue Modulation
 Ch3: Digital Modulation
 Ch4: Transmission Line Theory
 Ch5: Waveguides
 Ch6: Coding
 Ch7: Antennas
 Ch8: Communication Systems: Examples
 Microwave links, mobiles, satellite communications, GPS, radar,
optical communications

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Introduction
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COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS
 Radio – AM – LW, MW, SW: FM
 TV – VHF, UHF, Analogue, Digital, HDTV
 Radar, Sonar
 GPS
 Mobile phones, 2G, 3G, 4G
 Satellite Communications

VOR, ILS, SSR, DME, OMEGA

 Navigational Systems:

 Telephone, Fax, Email, internet

 Frequency used for these services?

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LETS CHECK THE UNITS
 Exa= 1018 E
 Peta = 1015 P
 Tera = 1012 T
 Giga = 109 G
 Mega = 106 M
 Kilo = 103 k
 Milli = 10-3 m
 Micro = 10-6 µ
 Nano = 10-9 n
 Pico = 10-12 p
 Femto = 10-15 f
 Atto = 10-18 a

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UNITS - CONTINUED
 100 THz
 10 Gb/s
 10 GB
 5 MΩ
 3 mH
 7 µm
 2 nF
 4.5 fs
 5 micron
 3Ȧ

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 FREQUENCY VS WAVELENGTH
 f Frequency
 λ wavelength: Lamda
 T = Period = 1/f
 λ = 2πf = angular frequency
 c = f. λ = speed of all e.m. in free space ≅ air
 λ = c/f check units = m/sec over /sec = m

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 LW radio f = 300 kHz >λ=3x108ms-1/3x105s-1= 103 m

 FM radio f = 100 MHz > λ=3x108ms-1/108s-1= 3 m

 Light wave λ = 0.5 µm

> f = c/λ= 3x108ms-1/0.5x10-6m
= 6 x 1014/s = 600 THz

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meter

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(E.M.) ELECTROMAGNETIC WAVES
 A type of wave in which signal propagates via exchanging
energy between Electric and magnetic field
 All communication systems use EM waves except Sonar
 In your 3rd year you will study about Electromagnetic Fields
 In Circuit Theory: Power is related to V and I

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 Find the wavelength if the
operating frequency is 1 GHz.

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MW radio f = 1500 kHz λ=?

SW radio f = 50 MHz λ =?

FM radio f = 110 MHz λ =?

Satellite f = 10 GHz λ =?

Radar f = 20 GHz λ =?

CD λ = 0.8 µm f=?

Blue CD λ = 0.5 µm f=?

Optical comm, λ = 1.55 µm f=?

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IMPORTANCE OF HIGHER FREQUENCY FOR
COMMUNICATIONS

 Antenna Efficiency
 Bandwidth

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EM WAVES
 VLF: very Low Frequency: 3 kHz – 30 kHz Omega
 LF: Low Frequency: 30-300 kHz: LW Radio
 MF: medium Frequency: 300-3000 kHz: MW Radio
 HF: High Frequency: 3-30 MHz: SW Radio
 VHF: very High Frequency: 30-300 MHz: FM, mobile
 UHF: Ultra High Frequency: 300-3000 MHz: TV
 SHF: Super High Frequency: 3-30 GHz: Radar,
satellite
 EHF: Extremely High Frequency: 30-300 GHz

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 Terahertz ≡ THz ∼ 0.1 to 10 THz, imaging, spectroscopy
 Infrared frequency below visible light (red), λ > 0.7 µm
 Visible light λ between 0.4- 0.7 µm
 Ultraviolet, frequency higher than violet light or λ < 0.4 µm
 X-rays
 Gamma rays
 Cosmic rays

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ANTENNA EFFICIENCY
 An antenna is only efficient when its dimension is comparable
to its operating wavelength
 Antenna efficiency ∝ antenna size/wavelength
 Best dipole antenna, length L = λ/2
 Best dish antenna, diameter, D >>λ
(Chapter 7: Antennas)

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A current carrying conductor

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A high conductive metallic surface

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 AM station using 600 kHz, λ = 500 m, L = 250 m
 FM station at 100 MHz, λ = 3 m, L = 1.5 m is good
 Omega navigation system developed by US Navy
operates at 10-14 kHz, there are 8 antennas each 400 m
high, they are costly, but still electrically small, as for 10
kHz, λ = 30 km, which is >> 400 m
 Is it easy to install a 400 m high antenna?
 What is the height of The Shard? 310 m
 Can we make a 15 km high antenna? Given £1 Billion?
 What is height of Everest? 8.8 km !

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ANTENNA EFFICIENCY
 Sky satellite dish typically 60 cm diameter operates at 10 GHz,
has a gain of 3000.
 However, if you reduce the operating frequency to 100 MHz
(reduced by 100 times) then you need a dish antenna of 60 m
(100 times bigger) in diameter for the same performance.

 Can you mount it on the side-wall of your house?

 Can it be carried by a Boeing 747 or a missile as its navigation
antenna?
 So higher the operating frequency, better for antenna size

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 Bandwidth needed

 System should be able to provide that

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 Audio system: could be 5 kHz be enough
 Old TV 10 MHz may be OK
 Digital TV
 HD TV
 4k TV
 Internet speed: what is desired?

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 BANDWIDTH OF THE SYSTEM
 MF: 2700 kHz: can have 500 Tel channel @ 5 kHz BW
 HF: 27 MHz: can have 5000 Tel channels or 5 TV channels
 VHF: 270 MHz: 50000 Tel or 50 TV channels
 UHF: 2.7 GHz: 0.5 million tel or 500 TV channels
 SHF: 27 GHz: 5 million tel or 5000 TV channels
 EHF?
 Lightwave at 1.5 µm = 200 THz, if we can use 1% of this spectrum
that can handle 40 billion tel channels or 40 million TV channel!!
 How many people now live in this earth?
Do we need this capacity?
What about downloading of information or video on demand?

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 If possible we can go for higher frequencies as bandwidth will
be higher and antennas would be more efficient
 But, need to have the technology: to generate, guide, process,
and detect the signals.
 Generating higher frequency is generally costly
 Transmission can be guided or free-space, and we need to
know about the technology, loss and price
 Controlled by regulator, as the spectrum used for many civilian
and defence applications.

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TRANSPARENCY OF THE ATMOSPHERE

This shows that atmosphere is NOT transparent for all the

frequencies
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 X band= 8-12 GHz
Ku band 12-18 GHz
K band 18-27 GHz
Ka band 27-40 GHz
V band 40-75 GHz
W band 75-110 GHz
mm wave 110 – 300 GHz
λ = 2.7 mm to 1mm

Bands need to be carefully selected

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COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS
 Free space
 Loss depends on the atmospheric absorptions

 Guided wave (Chapter 5)

 Loss depends on the waveguides we use

 Later on we will discuss about different

waveguides

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RECAP: IMPORTANCE OF HIGHER
FREQUENCY FOR COMMUNICATIONS
 Antenna Efficiency
 Bandwidth

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 Often log scale is used in solving
engineering problems

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 dB
 dB = 10 log10 P1/P2
 If we consider volts or current ?
 dB = 20 log10V1/V2 or 20 log10 I1/I2
 dB always represent ratio of two signals

 It does not give absolute power

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 dB : DECIBEL
 P1/P2 = 1000 ≡ in dB ?
 10 log10 P1/P2 = 10 log10 103 = 10 x 3 = 30 dB
 P1/P2 = 0.001 so dB = ? 10 log1010-3 = -30 dB
 P1/P2 = 0.01
 P1/P2 = 0.1
 P1/P2 = 1
 P1/P2 = 1012
 P1/P2= 10-15

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 The output of this radio station is 100 dB !!
 This is a wrong statement

 Loss of a system was 30 dB

 Gain of an amplifier is 40 dB

 If ratio of two powers is 10𝑛𝑛 then in dB it is 10𝑛𝑛

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 dBm AND dBW
 These are not ratios
 These are absolute power units

 In dBm, it is compared to mW
 In dBW, it is compared to W

 dBm = 10 log10 (P/1mW)

 dBW = 10 log10 (P/1W)

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dBm AND dBW: not ratio anymore
 100 mW = 10 log10 (100mW/1mW) = 20 dBm
 1 kW = 10 log10 103W/10-3W= 60 dBm
 0.01 mW = ? -20 dBm
 1 µW = ? - 30 dBm

 100 W = 10 log10100W/1W = 20 dBW

 1 kW = 30 dBW
 1 µW = ? = - 60 dBW

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TRANSMISSION LINE
 If the input power of a transmission line is 1 kW and the loss of
the transmission line is 5 dB/m. What would be the output
power after 10 m?

 Total loss 5 dB/m x 10 m = 50 dB

 Pout = Pin x 10-5 = 1 kW x 10-5 = 10 mW

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 Data rate depends on the frequency used

 For simple binary systems

 Sampling rate should be at least double the highest frequency
contents of the signal

 (will be covered in 3rd Year Signal Processing)

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 Signals are either ‘1’ or ‘0’

 User need to detect either ‘1’ or ‘0’

 Signal

 Random noise

 Signal with noise

1 0 1 0  Detect as

 Once detected no error in the system

 But if noise is high compared to signal strength, there
may be error in detecting
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  0 or 1 : 2 level detection

 Multilevel detection

 Each sample can convey

more than 1 bit information
 In this case 0 – 7 or 8 levels
8 = 23
 Therefore, each sample can
convey 3 bits of information
 Can this divided into 80 levels? Or 1000 levels?
 Will it be possible to detect then?

Depends on the NOISE 46

  Signal

 Signal + small noise  If noise level is high

the signal values
between steps
should be higher
 Signal + large noise

 Practical multilevel signal

𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆
𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿 ∼
𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁
 Call signal-to-noise ratio = S/N
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 Capacity ∝ Bandwidth × Time
 Hartley-Shannon law
𝐶𝐶 = 𝐵𝐵 log 2 (1 + 𝑆𝑆⁄𝑁𝑁)
 If signal /noise = 1000
𝐵𝐵 = 2.7 𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘
𝐶𝐶 = 2700 × log 2 (1 + 1000)
= 26.9 𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘𝑘

 For binary system

𝐶𝐶 = 2 × 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵 (𝐻𝐻𝐻𝐻) !
bps

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1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1

1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 1
1 0 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 1
0 1 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 1
1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0
0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1
1 0 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0
1 1 1 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 1
1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0

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 Suppose maximum data rate of a channel is 1200 bps.
Then you can have 8 such channels to have 9600 bps.

A B A B

 Each 1200 bps, 8 channels

Advantage Disadvantage
A B
• Parallel : Simple • Many channels
tech. • Requires superior
 9600 bps • Serial : One data rate could be
channel costly technology

 PC to printer: Parallel connector since length

often < 10 m
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 Simplex vs Duplex

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Simplex

Half-duplex

Full-Duplex

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  Road works

 One way

 Stops when red

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  One way

 Two ways at the same

time

 Traffic can flow in both the directions

but at a given time only in one direction

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Walkie Talkie

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  Simplex: Only one
T R way communication

T R  Half-Duplex :
Alternately used for
forward and reverse
R T direction. E.g. Data bus

 Full-Duplex : They may

T R not be of same capacity.
e.g. Two separate wires
of different 𝒇𝒇𝒄𝒄
R T modulation

 Three possibilities exists for the reverse channel: no channel

(top), time switching (middle), and permanent (bottom)

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 Simplex links:
TV distributions: This provides one way communication
 Duplex links:
Transfer data in both directions
 Half-Duplex links:
Not simultaneously. 16 bit bus on microprocessor
‘TALK’ & ‘HOLD’
 Full-Duplex links:
Two channels are used simultaneously, Telephone circuits

T R
 Can be two separate circuits
or even could be same wire
R T using different carrier
frequency

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 What is being transmitted?

 Music, data, video etc

 We need to put these data/information/signal to the high

frequency carrier

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 Modulation and demodulation needed at both ends of a
broadband duplex channel

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Modulation

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MODULATION
 Analogue (Chapter 2)
 Voice, video, music, sonar, radar, ECG, etc
 Digital (Chapter 3)
 CD, DVD, Text, Data

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ADVANTAGES OF MODULATION
Transfer a signal into a carrier (to higher frequency)
Why?
Easy to transmit (simpler antennas)
Multiplexing
Different signals modulated with different frequency
As Example: different radio station uses different frequency
Different voice channels (in telephone) uses different frequency
Take advantage of higher frequency - bandwidth and antenna
efficiency
Error coding possible (Chapter 6)

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Will be covered in Chapter 2
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  Analog signal

 Sampling signal

 PWM or PDM

 PPM

 PAM

 PCM

Will be covered in Chapter 3

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 Analogue:
 Simpler technology, hardware specific, needs
smaller bandwidth, but once noise is added cannot
be eliminated. But all natural systems are analogue.
 Digital:
 more resistant to noise, easy to store and process,
can be coded for error control, software can process
signal, but needs higher bandwidth. Not physical, so
always needs A-D and D-A converters.

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 Units, symbols
 Wavelength and frequency
 dB, dBm, dBW
 Data rate
 Serial vs parallel
 Simplex vs duplex
 Advantages of higher frequency
 Advantage of modulation
 Analogue vs Digital

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 FDM: frequency division multiplexing
 TDM: Time division multiplexing
 WDM: Wavelength division multiplexing

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NEXT CHAPTER

Chapter 2: Amplitude Modulation

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