Optical Communication Theory and Techniques

Part I: Communication Theory and Digital Transmission

June 6, 2012

The signals employed in a QPSK system are

si (t) = A cos(ω0 t − αi ) 0 ≤ t ≤ T, i = 1, 2, 3, 4

where the transmitted symbols {αi } are independent and take on the values
π
αi = (2i − 1) i = 1, 2, 3, 4
4
with equal probability. Knowing that ω0 T = N2π, with N an integer:

1. Find an orthonormal basis of the signals subspace and draw the corresponding signal constella-
tion.

2. Supposing that the channel has impulse response h(t) = δ(t) and simply adds white Gaussian
noise with power spectral density N0 /2 (AWGN channel):

(a) Specify the decision zones of an optimum receiver.

(b) Compute a union bound of the average probability of symbol error P(E ).

3. Supposing now that the channel impulse response is instead h(t) = δ(t) + 0.1δ(t − T ), the same
receiver may observe 4 different signals for each transmitted signal.

(a) Draw the signal constellation observed by the receiver in this case.
(b) Compute a union bound of P(E ) under the hypothesis that the decision zones remain
unchanged.
Solution:

1. The signals can be written as the linear combination

si (t) = A cos αi cos ω0 t + A sin αi sin ω0 t

and, taking into account that for ω0 T = N2π the functions sin ω0 t and cos ω0 t turn out to be
orthogonal, it is easy to see that the dimensionality of the signals subspace is Q = 2. Thus, an
orthonormal basis of the signals subspace is given by
r
2
σ1 (t) = cos ω0 t
T
r 0≤t≤T.
2
σ2 (t) = sin ω0 t
T
As the energy of all signals√ is Es = A2 T /2, the images of the signals are evenly distributed
along a circle with radius Es and, with respect to the above orthonormal basis, the signal
constellation is as shown in the following figure

σ2
q
s2 Es
2
s1
√
Es
q q σ1
Es Es
− 2 2

q
s3 − Es
2 s4

2. (a) The decision zones are the four quadrants. Specifically, the first quadrant is the decision
zone for s1 , the second quadrant is the decision zone for s2 , and so on.
(b) For symmetry reasons, the average probability of error is P(E ) = P(E | α1 ). Conditionally
to the transmission of α1 and denoting by E1 j the pairwise error events, as E13 ⊂ E12 ∪ E14 ,
we have E12 ∪ E13 ∪ E14 = E12 ∪ E14 , such that

P(E | α1 ) ≤ P(E12 | α1 ) + P(E14 | α1 ) .

Again, for symmetry reasons, the pairwise error probabilities are

!
d
P(E12 | α1 ) = P(E14 | α1 ) = Q
2σ

where r r
Es N0
d=2 , σ= ,
2 2
and thus r 
 Es 
P(E ) = P(E | α1 ) ≤ 2Q   .
N0
3. (a) Denoting by a prime the image of the signal transmitted in the previous symbol time, the
images of the received signals can be written as

si j = si + 0.1s0j , i, j = 1, 2, 3, 4

So, given the transmission of si in the current time slot, the received image can be one of

si1 = si + 0.1s1 , si2 = si + 0.1s2 , si3 = si + 0.1s3 , si4 = si + 0.1s4

with equal probability. This means that the signal constellation is replicated around each
old image si but reduced by a factor 10.
σ2
s22 s21 s12 s11
s23 s24 s13 s14
d2
d1
σ1

s32 s31 s42 s41

s33 s34 s43 s44

(b) We still have that

P(E ) = P(E | α1 ) ≤ P(E12 | α1 ) + P(E14 | α1 )

and that
P(E12 | α1 ) = P(E14 | α1 ) ,
however, for computing P(E12 | α1 ) we have now to also account for the symbol trans-
mitted in the previous time slot. Denoting again by a prime the previous symbol, we
have
4
X
P(E12 | α1 ) = P(E12 | α1 , α0j )P(α0j ).
j=1

Taking into account that P(α0j ) = 1/4 and that (see the previous figure)

P(E12 | α1 , α10 ) = P(E12 | α1 , α40 )

P(E12 | α1 , α20 ) = P(E12 | α1 , α30 ) ,

we have
!
d1
P(E12 |α1 , α10 ) =Q
σ
!
d2
P(E12 | α1 , α2 ) = Q
0
σ
where
r r
Es p π Es
d1 = + 0.1 Es cos = 1.1
2 4 2
r r
Es p π Es
d2 = − 0.1 Es cos = 0.9
2 4 2
such that  r   r 
1  Es  1  Es 
P(E12 | α1 ) = Q 0.9  + Q 1.1 
2 N0 2 N0
and, finally,

P(E ) = P(E | α1 ) ≤ P(E12 | α1 ) + P(E14 | α1 )

= 2P(E12 | α1 )
 r   r 
 Es   Es 
= Q 0.9  + Q 1.1 
N0 N0