ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB.

6 1

6. PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS USING M-ARY

PSK AND QAM MODULATIONS OVER
BANDLIMITTED AWGN CHANNEL

6.1 OBJECTIVE
The effects of restricted bandwidth and noise in passband data transmissions
will be studied. The modulation technique can be either phase-shift keying (PSK) or
quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM). Several values are considered for the
system parameters, such as: the roll-off factor of the square-root raised cosine
(SRRC) filters, the modulation order (M), and the energy per bit-to-noise ratio
(Eb/N0). The perturbations determined by inter-symbol interference (ISI) and noise
over the useful signal are depicted using the eye pattern and the signal constellation.
Also, the bit error rate (BER) is estimated by simulation for each considered scheme.
Finally, the simulated BER is compared with the corresponding theoretical BER,
obtained using the BER Analysis Tool in Matlab, i.e., ‘bertool’.

6.2 PHASE MODULATION

Phase modulation (PM) is more efficient than frequency modulation but
requires more complex equipment. This efficiency is achieved by multilevel
modulation.
The carrier phase is changed every T - sec (Figure 6.1) and takes on discrete
values on the interval [0, 2]. This modulation technique is called phase shift keying
(PSK).
The PSK signal can be expressed as:
𝑠𝑃𝑆𝐾 (𝑡) = 𝐴0 cos[𝜔0 𝑡 + Φ(𝑡)]
where phase (t)=n, for nT<t<(n+1)T, is constant on each symbol interval T and
depends on data sequence.
2 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

0t+(t)

6
0, 3
2, 5
4 t
1 T 2T 3T 4T 5T 6T 7T

(t)
      
0 1 2 3 4 5 6

Fig. 6.1 PSK signal phase.

An alternate way to express the PSK signal is (it is similar to AM-DSB):

𝑠𝑃𝑆𝐾 (𝑡) = 𝐴0 ∑ 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑛𝑇) cos(𝜔0 𝑡 + Φ𝑛 )

𝑛
where g(t) is a rectangular pulse, g(t)=1, on the interval 0, T.
The digital information is transposed, by modulation, in the sequence of
phases n or in the sequence of phase changes n=n−n−1. The data
transmission by PSK technique should be synchronous because the phase changes
take place at equal intervals (T).
A local carrier, synchronous with the received carrier and having a known
fixed reference phase, is necessary in the receiver to establish the phase sequence
n. Carrier recovery from the received signal itself by a synchronization loop leads
to a multiple phase ambiguity, because there are M points on the interval 0, 2
around which the loop may perform the synchronization (M is the number of the
distinct values for n).
ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 3

To avoid such difficulties and the necessity for a known fixed reference phase,
the digital information can be coded in the phase changes n but not in the absolute
phases n. This method is known as differential phase shift keying modulation
(DPSK). In this way the reference phase in the receiver may have any value but with
no sensible change in a symbol interval. Another advantage of DPSK technique is
given by a low sensitivity to the slowly variation, compared with the symbol interval
T, of the channel parameters.
The PSK signal s(t) can be rewritten as
𝑠𝑃𝑆𝐾 (𝑡) = 𝐴0 ∑ 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑛𝑇) cos Φ𝑛 cos 𝜔0 𝑡 − 𝐴0 ∑ 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑛𝑇) sin Φ𝑛 sin 𝜔0 𝑡
𝑛 𝑛

and in this form, it is evident that the PSK signal can be considered as a sum of two
amplitudes modulated carriers of the same frequency but in quadrature, the
modulating signals being ∑𝑛 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑛𝑇) cos Φ𝑛 and ∑𝑛 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑛𝑇) sin Φ𝑛
(quadrature amplitude modulation - QAM).
There is a large series of normalized PM modems for data transmission over
voice channels. These are using 2, 4 or 8-level DPSK. The recommended values for
phase changes are:
2𝜋 2𝜋 2𝜋
Φ𝑛 , ∆Φ𝑛 ∈ { ,2 ,…,𝑀 }, convention A (ITU-T)
𝑀 𝑀 𝑀
or
𝜋 𝜋 𝜋
Φ𝑛 , ∆Φ𝑛 ∈ { , 3 , … , (2𝑀 − 1) }, convention B
𝑀 𝑀 𝑀
Constellation mappings (bits per symbol) are presented in Figure 6.2.
4 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

Fig. 6.2 PSK signal constellations.

ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 5

6.3 QUADRATURE - AMPLITUDE MODULATION (QAM)

In this type of modulation, two independent baseband data signals are
transmitted in the same bandwidth. The block scheme of the general QAM
transmission scheme is presented in Figure 6.3.

Fig. 6.3 General QAM principle.

The QAM signal expression is

𝑠𝑄𝐴𝑀 (𝑡) = 𝑥(𝑡) cos 𝜔0 𝑡 + 𝑦(𝑡) sin 𝜔0 𝑡
where x(t) and y(t) are the baseband signals. To obtain, in the receiving part, the
baseband signal x(t), this QAM signal is multiplied by a local carrier cos0t:
1
𝑠𝑄𝐴𝑀 (𝑡) cos 𝜔0 𝑡 = [𝑥(𝑡) + 𝑥(𝑡) cos(2 𝜔0 𝑡) + 𝑦(𝑡) sin(2 𝜔0 𝑡)]
2
The components x(t)cos(20t) and y(t)sin(20t) represent AM signals with their
frequency spectra centred on the twice of the carrier frequency and can be eliminated
using a lowpass filter. In the same way the baseband signal y(t) is obtained, the
received signal s(t) being multiplied by another local carrier, sin0t.
To transmit m bits per symbol interval (T), each group of m bits is encoded in
one of the M=2m levels (states) of the modulated carrier, which is considered like a
sum of two in quadrature carriers. To each state corresponds a point in a two -
dimensional space, with coordinates xk, yk, representing the amplitudes of these two
carriers. The graph of all points (xk, yk) representing the possible states of the
6 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

modulated carrier is called signal constellation. The 16-QAM (m = 4) signal

constellation is presented in Figure 6.4. On each branch, (in-phase, I, and quadrature,
Q), a multilevel signal with √M = 2m/2 = 4 (M=16 is a square value) levels is
transmitted, i.e., 𝑥𝑘 , 𝑦𝑘 ∈ {±𝑑, ±3𝑑, . . . , ±(√𝑀 − 1)𝑑}.

Fig. 6.4 16-QAM signal constellations.

The block scheme of a QAM data transmitter is presented in Figure 6.5.

Fig. 6.5 QAM data transmitter.

ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 7

To each group of m bits from the serial flow of data bits at the coder input will
correspond two values xk and yk at the coder outputs, representing the amplitudes of
rectangular pulses applied at the lowpass filters inputs. The input signals in these
lowpass filters, x(t) and y(t), can be expressed like:
𝑥(𝑡) = ∑ 𝑥𝑘 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇) ; 𝑦(𝑡) = ∑ 𝑦𝑘 𝑔(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇)
𝑘 𝑘
where g(t) is the rectangular pulse with unity amplitude and the duration T, equal
with the duration of m bits. If the response of the lowpass filters to the input g(t) is
h(t), then p(t) and q(t), their responses to x(t) and y(t), are:
𝑝(𝑡) = ∑ 𝑥𝑘 ℎ(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇) ; 𝑞(𝑡) = ∑ 𝑦𝑘 ℎ(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇)
𝑘 𝑘
The expression of the QAM signal can be rewritten as:
𝑠𝑄𝐴𝑀 (𝑡) = ∑ 𝑥𝑘 ℎ(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇) cos 𝜔0 𝑡 − ∑ 𝑦𝑘 ℎ(𝑡 − 𝑘𝑇) sin 𝜔0 𝑡
𝑘 𝑘
and a pair of coordinates xk, yk is a signal point, also called a symbol.

6.4 EXPERIMENTAL DEVELOPMENT

6.4.1 SIMULATION SCHEME PRESENTATION

In this section, the performances of passband data transmissions schemes will
be investigated. The block scheme in Simulink of the considered data transmission
system is presented in Figure 6.6.
The scheme in Figure 6.6 includes three main sections: the transmitter part
(these blocks are marked with red), the channel model (the yellow box), and the
receiver part (the blue box). In addition, the blocks used for the performance
estimation (i.e., BER, received signal constellation, and the received signal eye
pattern) are included in the green box.
In the transmitter, an M-ary PSK or QAM modulated signal is generated first.
Actually, the ‘Random Integer Generator’ block generates a sequence of L random
uniformly distributed integers in the range [0, M – 1], where M is the M-ary number.
8 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

M-ary PSK and QAM Passband Modulation

VAR 0.9984 VAR 0.06235
[100x1] [800x1]
Transmitter Variance1 Transmitted BB signal power Variance Transmitted PB signal power

[100x1]
Random In1 [100x1] [800x1] [800x1]
[100x1] Out1 Upconverter
Integer [100x1] [800x1] Desired
In2 Square root
Random Integer
Generator M-PSK or M-QAM Raised Cosine
mod Modulator, Baseband Transmit Filter

Constant
[800x1]

[800x1] AWGN
AWGN
Channel
Discrete-Time
Eye Diagram [800x1]
Scope - transmitter

[100x1] [800x1] [800x1]

In1 8 Downconverter
Out1 [100x1] [800x1] [800x1]
Square root
[100x1] In2
Downsample
Raised Cosine
M-PSK or M-QAM mod Receive Filter
Demodulator, Baseband Channel
Constant1

Receiver

[100x1] [800x1]

VAR 0.9943 Received Constellation Discrete-Time

[100x1]
Eye Diagram
Variance2 Received BB signal power Scope - receiver

Tx
0 BER
[100x1] 3
BER 0 No. of bit errors
Rx 8584 Total no. of
[100x1]
transmitted bits
Compute BER BER Display

Performance Displays

Fig. 6.6 Simulink block scheme of the analyzed passband data transmission system.

The data symbol interval is denoted by T. Therefore, the signaling speed is given by
vs = 1 / T, while the corresponding bit rate is Rb = log2(M) / T. Next, the ‘M-PSK or
M-QAM Modulator, Baseband’ block generates either the M-PSK or the M-QAM
baseband signal, as specified in the initialization file, corresponding to the input
sequence of M-ary numbers. Then, the M-ary baseband signal signal is filtered by a
square root raised–cosine (SRRC) filter (this transmit filter forms together with the
receive counterpart the overall characteristic that minimizes the ISI). The SRRC filter
has a roll-off factor denoted as R and an upsampling factor of N. Therefore, the SRRC
filter’s impulse response has a power of 1/N and occupies a total bandwidth of (1+R)
vs / 2. The output filtered signal can be analyzed using the eye pattern – transmitter
block. Considering that this signal is not affected yet by the noise and channel
distortions the eye pattern will show a wide-open eye. Please, note that both eye
diagrams, in the transmitter and in the receiver, respectively, represent ONLY the
in-phase component of the complex M-ary filtered baseband signal. The last block
ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 9

in the transmitter converts up the M-ary baseband signal to a passband carrier having
the frequency Fc.
The channel model includes a noise adder. The additive white Gaussian noise
(AWGN) block adds a random noise with the power PN to the input M-ary passband
signal with the mean power of PPB = PBB/(2N). The factor 2N in the nominator
includes the scaling factor N introduced by the SRRC and a factor of 2 introduced by
the carrier upconverter. For the PSK signal, the baseband mean signal power is PBB
= 1 [W], while for the QAM baseband signal, the mean power is estimated as the
average of all signal elements (in the signal constellation). The parameter that
controls the noise power is the energy per bit-to-noise ratio denoted by
𝐸𝑏 𝑃BB
[dB] = 10 𝑙𝑜𝑔10 [ ] [dB]
𝑁0 4 log 2 (𝑀)𝑃𝑁
where
𝑃BB 𝑇
𝐸𝑏 =
2𝑁 log 2 (𝑀)
𝑃𝑁 2𝑃𝑁 𝑇
𝑁0 = =
1 𝑁
2𝑇/𝑁
The receiver part includes a downconverter (from the carrier frequency Fc to
baseband), a SRRC filter (identical to the transmitter one) and an M-ary PSK or
QAM signal demodulation.
The eye-pattern in the receiver will be compared with the transmitter one to
notice how the channel affects the system performances (the receiver eye closure
determined by ISI and noise). The same perturbations can be noticed by analyzing
the received baseband signal constellation. In addition, the BER performance is
estimated by comparing the binary representations of all M-ary numbers
demodulated in the receiver with the corresponding clean M-ary numbers entering
the modulator block. The ‘BER Display’ block shows the BER value, the number of
erroneous bits, and the total number of transmitted bits.
In order to check the signal average power in several points of the scheme in
Figure 6.1, there were introduced three ‘Variance’ blocks, which estimate the power
of the baseband transmitted signal, passband transmitted signal, and baseband
received signal, respectively.
10 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

6.4.2 SIMULATION PROCEDURE

Open the initialization/configuration file M_PSK_QAM_init.m (you have to
do this BEFORE opening the simulation model file
passband_transm_M_ary_PSK_QAM.slx). This initialization file fixes the scheme
parameters, as following:

➢ The data sequence length (in number of M-ary symbols in each transmitted block):
L = 100;

➢ The data symbol interval (seconds):

T = 1e-6;

➢ The carrier frequency (Hz):

Fc = 1/T * 5;

➢ The total simulation time (seconds):

Sim_Time = 3;

➢ The modulation type selector (type the characters ‘PSK’ or ‘QAM’):

mod_sel = 'PSK';

➢ The modulation order selector (= the number of signal elements in the constellation):
M = 4;

➢ The SRRC filter group delay (in no. of symbols; DO NOT CHANGE THIS VALUE!):
GD = 4;

➢ The roll-off factor (= the bandwidth excess factor for SRRC filters):
R = 0.6;

➢ The filter up-sampling factor (for SRRC filters):

N = 8;

➢ The channel energy per bit-to-noise ratio (in decibells):

EbN0dB = 10;

Every time when you run a new simulation (with new parameters), you should
start by running the M_PSK_QAM_init.m file first. Next, open the simulation model
file passband_transm_M_ary_PSK_QAM.slx and run this one, too. Analyze the eye-
pattern diagrams from the transmitter and receiver. Also, analyze the noise and ISI
ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 11

effects on the received signal constellation. It is recommended to change only one

parameter for each new simulation. Change one parameter and analyze the changes
in the scheme performance displays.
The final and the most significant system performance measure is the BER.
Next, the simulated and the theoretical BER values have to be obtained for several
modulation types and Eb/N0 values. For each pair (modulation type, Eb/N0), the
simulated BER value is read from the ‘BER Display’ block at the end of the
simulation time. The corresponding theoretical BER value is read from the
performance plot obtained by running the ‘bertool’ Matlab tool. Therefore, you have
to fill in the Table 6.1 all BER values obtained by means of simulations and by
running the ‘bertool’ (the theoretical BER plot).

Table. 6.1 BER performances for several modulation types.

BER
th. sim. th. sim. th. sim. th. sim. th. sim.
Eb/N0 [dB]
Modulation 0 2 4 ... max.
type
BPSK
QPSK
8PSK
16PSK
4QAM
16QAM
32QAM
64QAM
128QAM
256QAM

6.4.3 BER PERFORMANCES ESTIMATION FOR QPSK

For the sake of clarity, the performances of the QPSK data transmission
scheme are derived in the following.
12 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

In order to have a BER performances theoretical reference you have to run

first the ‘bertool’ from the Matlab command line. Therefore, go to the Matlab
Command Window ‘>>’ and type:

bertool;

When you enter this command in the command line, the window ‘Bit Error Rate
Analysis Tool’ opens (see Figure 6.7).

Fig. 6.7 Bit Error Rate Analysis Tool.

Now, press the ‘Theoretical’ button on top-left, set the Eb/N0 range = 0:10 dB, select
the PSK modulation type, Modulation order = 4 and press the ‘Plot’ button. As a
result, the window in Figure 6.8 is opened, which plots the theoretical BER curve for
the QPSK system.
ANALOG AND DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS – LAB. 6 13

Fig. 6.8 Theoretical BER performances for QPSK transmission.

In order to read the theoretical BER values from the plot in Figure 6.8, please
select in ‘Tools’ menu the option ‘Data Cursor’. As shown in Figure 6.8, the cursor
can be used to select and read several points from the ‘BER Figure’ plot. In Table
6.2, the BER theoretical values are presented for several Eb/N0 values.

Table. 6.2 Theoretical BER values for QPSK.

BER
T S T S T S T S T S T S
Eb/N0 [dB]
Modulation 0 2 4 6 8 10

QPSK 0.0786 0.0375 0.0125 0.0024 1.9e-4 3.9e-6

In order to obtain the corresponding simulated BER values, you have to run
the simulation files as described in Section 6.4.2. For example, for the first simulated
BER value (Eb/N0 = 0 dB), you have to fix the following parameter in the
M_PSK_QAM_init.m function:

EbN0dB = 0;
14 PASSBAND DATA TRANSMISSIONS

Now, run this initialization file to fix all these parameters and then, run the model
file. Please, let the simulation run until the end (in the bottom bar the running time
should reach T = Sim_Time = 0.02 s). Meanwhile, you can analyze the evolution
with time of the received signal constellation and the transmitter and receiver eye
patterns. When the simulation is finished, read the value of the estimated BER and
fill it in the corresponding column of Table 6.3. Please, check all simulated BER
values as noted in Table 6.3.

Table. 6.3 Theoretical and simulated BER values for QPSK.

BER
T S T S T S T S T S T S
Eb/N0 [dB]
Modulation 0 2 4 6 8 10

QPSK 0.0786 0.11 0.0375 0.0524 0.0125 0.0172 0.0024 0.0037 1.9e-4 2.0e-4 3.9e-6 0

Practical assignment:
Following the procedure described above (in Section 6.4.3), determine
the theoretical and simulated BER values for all modulation types from Table
6.1, i.e., BPSK, 8PSK, 16PSK, 4QAM, 16QAM, 32QAM, 64QAM, 128QAM,
and 256QAM.