3 - RF Channel Analysis Rev1

3.
RF Channel Analysis
Power
Frequency Selective Fading

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11/28/2013 Copyright CelPlan Technolgoies, Inc. 3-1

Contents
1. The RF Communication Channel
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
3. Signal Transition
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel
1. RF Channel in Frequency Domain
2. RF Channel In Time Domain
3. RF Channel in Power Domain

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel

3

The RF Communications Channel Topics
1. What are the main elements that constitute an RF
communications channel?
2. What are the components of an RF transmitted signal?
3. What is an RF Channel?
4. What is the transfer characteristic of an RF channel?
5. What are the main impairments caused by an RF channel?
6. What are the main tasks of a Receiver?
7. How does noise and interference affect the reception of a signal?

3
The RF Communication Channel
• The RF Signal Transmitter
– Information Data
– Control Data (define how, where, which and whose information data is sent)
– Reference Signal (used to counteract the RF channel distortion at the receiver)
– Data may have to be split in sub-channels
• The RF Channel
– An RF channel can be frequency selective or flat (larger the bandwidth more selective it is): an RF channel is
said to be flat within its coherence bandwidth
– An RF channel varies its characteristics over time: an RF channel is said to be flat within its coherence time
– Inter-symbol interference arises from overlap between one symbol and multipath of previous symbols
• A symbol multipath do not interfere, as they will only cause a phase shift
• The RF Signal Receiver
– Equalize the frequency response of the channel in a dynamic (time wise way) using reference data
– Eventually use several sub-channels to carry a higher data throughput
– Use control data to identify what information is being transmitted (when, where and to whom)
– Extract information data
• Noise and Interference
– Thermal noise is proportional to the channel bandwidth
– Interference should be controlled by conflict avoidance and averaging

3
The RF Communication Channel Summary
1. The main components of an RF communication channel were
described
2. The components of a transmitted signal were described
3. The concept of RF channel was defined
4. The impairments caused by an RF channel were listed
5. The functions of an RF receiver were described
6. The received signal is subject to noise and interference

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel

3
2. The RF Signal
Spectrum of a phase modulated carrier

1 1.5
Filtered Symbols Phase Transition
0.8
1
0.6
0.5
Amplitude
Amplitude
0.4
0
0.2 0 5 10 15 20
-0.5
0
-50,000 -30,000 -10,000 10,000 30,000 50,000 -1
-0.2
-1.5
-0.4 Time
Frequency (1/T=10,000 Hz)

The RF Signal Topics
1. How does a digital modulated RF signal look like?
2. What is the spectrum of the demodulated signal?
3. What happens to the modulated signal at the transitions?
4. Do sharp transitions create large bandwidth interference?
5. How this interference can be avoided?
6. What is a raised cosine filter? What is its characteristic
representation in the time and frequency domains?
7. What is a filter roll-off factor?
8. Why a square root raised cosine filter is used in many
applications? What is its advantage?
9. What content does the RF signal have to carry?

3
Signal Formation
• To calculate the spectrum of each symbol transition in
phase modulation we can consider a continuous sine wave
multiplied by a rectangular pulse that has one symbol width
1.5
Carrier sinewave and symbol pulse
1
0.5
Amplitude
0
0 200 400 600 800 1000
-0.5
-1
-1.5
Time (µs)
1.5
Carrier Symbol- carrier sinewave multiplied by symbol pulse
1
Amplitude
0.5
0
-0.5 0 200 400 600 800 1000
-1
-1.5
Time (µs)
𝐹 𝑤 = 𝑇 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑐 (𝑤𝑇/2) Pulse Spectrum

1
𝐵=𝑇 Bandwidth
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Signal Spectrum
• This signal spectrum has the property of having zero energy at
regular intervals (equal to the inverse of the symbol duration)
Spectrum of a phase modulated carrier
1
0.8
0.6
0.4
Amplitude
0.2
0
-50,000 -40,000 -30,000 -20,000 -10,000 0 10,000 20,000 30,000 40,000 50,000
-0.2
-0.4

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Signal Transitions
• Sharp transitions occur at each symbol boundary but the signal spectrum can still be
represented by the sinc function
• The transitions that generated the high frequency components can be smoothened by a
low pass filter with linear phase, not to distort the signal
• Low pass filters can be used for this purpose. The most common being the Raised Cosine
(RC) filter, defined by equations below. The factor α (filter roll-off factor) is a measure of
the excess bandwidth required by the filter expressed in fraction of the bandwidth
1.5 1.5
Unfiltered Symbol Phase transition Filtered Symbols Phase Transition
1 1
0.5 0.5
Amplitude
Amplitude
0 0
0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
-0.5 -0.5
-1 -1
-1.5 -1.5
Time Time
𝜋𝛼𝑡
𝑡 cos ( 𝑇 )
ℎ 𝑡 = 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑐( ) RC filter (time domain)
𝑇 1−( 2𝛼𝑡) 2
𝑇
𝜏 𝜋𝑇 1−𝛼
𝐻 𝑓 = 2 (1 + cos 𝑓 ) RC filter (frequency domain)
𝛼 2𝑇

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Signal Transitions
• A roll-off factor of zero reduces the high frequency components and
narrows the main bandwidth. The use of this roll-off helps to meet
stringent emission masks
Frequency response of a raised cosine filter Impulse response of a raised cosine filter
100
1
80 0.8
roll-off=1
60 0.6
Amplitude
roll- roll-off=1
Amplitude
40 off=0.5 0.4
roll-off=0.5
20 0.2 roll-off=0
0 0
-20000 -10000 0 10000 20000 -500 -400 -300 -200 -100 0 100 200 300 400 500
-0.2
-20
Frequency (1/T= 10,000 Hz)
-0.4
Time (µs)

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Signal Transitions
• The application of this filter helps the reduction of emissions, but on the
receive side the noise is still received equally over the whole bandwidth
• To minimize noise the raised cosine filter was replaced by a square root
raised cosine filter (SRRC) at the transmitter and a matched filter at the
receiver
• This results in a total response equivalent to the raised cosine filter with
the addition of noise filtering in the receiver
• The equation for the square root cosine raised filter is the same as for
the cosine raised filter with the application of a square root
Frequency Response of a square root raised cosine filter
10
8
roll-off=1
6
roll-off=0.5
Amplitude
4 roll-off=1
0
-18000 -13000 -8000 -3000 2000 7000 12000 17000
-2
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The RF Signal Content
• The RF signal has to carry at least the following components
• Information Data
– This is the user data that has to be delivered through the RF communication
channel
– The data content is not previously known
• Control Data
– This data provides detail about the network access and characteristics and
when information data is sent, at which location, its origin and destination
• Reference Signal
– Is known information to the receiver that is used to estimate the response of
the RF channel
• Sub-channelization
– A broadband channel may have the information data modulated on a single
carrier or on multiple carriers
– Each carrier is called a sub-channel
– The set of carriers is called a channel

3
The RF Signal Summary
1. The modulation of a carrier by a pulse was shown graphically and
mathematically
2. Carrier transitions between symbols were displayed graphically
3. The effect on carrier transitions by filters was shown graphically
4. The characteristics of raised cosine filters were shown and the
effect of the roll-off factor used
5. The reason to use a square root raised cosine filter at the
transmitter and receiver was explained
6. The content carried by the RF signal was described

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel

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3. The RF Channel

Power
The RF Channel
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The RF channel topics
1. What is the RF channel?
2. What are the variations expected in an RF channel?
3. Does an RF channel vary over time?
4. What is a flat channel? How can we get a flat channel for a
duration of a symbol?
5. What are the equations that characterize the transmit and receive
signals?
6. Why is it important for the designer to understand the behavior of
the RF channel?
7. What is inter-symbol interference?
8. What causes the non linearity in a channel response?
9. What would be an ideal symbol bandwidth and duration?

3
•
The RF Channel
An RF channel represents a certain amount of RF spectrum that is used to transport
information
– The RF channel response is not constant or linear
• When an RF signal is applied to an antenna energy is radiated into free space
– This energy propagates outward in all directions (for an isotropic antenna) and is subject to
reflections, diffractions and refractions until it reaches the receiver
– The receiver antenna then captures part of this energy as the received RF signal
• A transmitted signal can be broken in its sinusoidal components, so it suffices to analyze
its component frequencies
– This frequency can be expressed as a vector characterized by its amplitude and phase, which can be
represented in its complex trigonometric or exponential forms
• The RF Channel presents the following impairments to the input signal
– Non linear frequency response
– Frequency response varies with time
– Inter-symbol interference is caused by symbols being affected by multipath of previous symbols
Power
𝑠𝑒 𝑖𝜑
𝑠 = 𝑠 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝜑 + 𝑖 𝑠 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝜑 = Transmitted Sinusoid

(Flat or Selective)
Frequency
𝑟 = 𝑟 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝜑 + 𝑖 𝑟 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝜑 = 𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝜑 Received Sinusoid Tim

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11/28/201 Copyright CelPlan Technolgoies, Inc. Time 3-22

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RF Channel Response (frequency x time)
• RF channel variation in frequency and time
• It is possible to verify the interval during with the channel does not vary
more than a certain amount
• This interval will then define the flatness of the channel

3
RF Channel Response (frequency x time)
• Top view of the channel response
• Fading duration and width can be established

3
RF Channel Response (multipath)
• The impulse response analysis of the channel shows the multipath components
of a single impulse
• Each peak in the curve indicates one multipath
• The separation between occurrences is due to scatter physically separated

3
The RF Channel Response
• The RF channel response to an input signal can be estimated by sending
a known reference signal, which can be used to compensate dynamically
the frequency response of the RF channel
– The Reference Signal can be:
• A training sequence: know data sent with the information data
• A pilot: know data sent on a different frequency (but close to) from the information
data frequency
• The inter-symbol interference has to be compensated by using Sequence
Estimation Equalizers
– These equalizers test all possible states of overlapped symbols and select the
most probable outcome
– This requires a lot of processing power, as all the combinations have to be tested
during the duration of each symbol
• Ideally each symbol should:
– Operate over a flat part of the spectrum
• The channel variation should be smaller than e.g. 3 dB across the frequency band and the
duration of the symbol
– The symbol duration should be much larger than the multipath spread, so the
inter-symbol interference is minimized
3
The RF Channel
• The RF channel response is not constant, due to variations in frequency
and time, as illustrated
– Those variations impair the signal detection and have to be deal with.
• Predicting the variations and equalizing the channel is one way to deal
with the issue, but this is easier said than done
– Several techniques were developed for this, but none is perfect and all of
them require lots of processing time and power. It is easier to adjust channel
parameters from one symbol to the next, but it is hard to compensate
variations within one symbol. Besides, the number of iterations grows
exponentially with the number of overlapped symbols
• Another option is to restrict the symbol length in frequency and time, so
it is present during bandwidths and times in which channel variations are
smaller and the channel can be considered flat
– This requires understanding the causes of channel variation and the extent
in which the channel can be considered flat in frequency and time domains.
• For the RF designer, the understanding of these impairments is key for
taking decisions between scenarios, analyzing prediction results or
deciding the best location for deployment and orientation of antennas

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The RF Channel Summary
1. The RF channel frequency response is variable with the frequency
and time
2. The instantaneous response of an RF channel can only be
expressed by a complex relation
3. An RF channel can be considered flat over a certain frequency
range and time
4. A signal that is affected by a non flat RF channel needs to be
equalized
5. Know information must be sent to estimate the channel variations

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel
1. Multipath Fading
2. Shadow Fading
1. Wind Effect
2. Vehicles Effect
3. Doppler Effect
4. Fading Types
5. Multipath Mitigation
6. Comparing Multipath Resilience in Technologies
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3.1 RF Channel In Frequency Domain
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RF Channel In Frequency Domain Topics
1. What is multipath in RF propagation?
2. What happens to a receiver that receives multipaths?
3. What is multipath fading?
4. What amount of multipath can destroy the received signal?
5. How does multipath affect the carrier and the modulating signal?
6. How multipath can be avoided?
7. What is coherence bandwidth?
8. What does coherence bandwidth correlation mean?
9. What is the typical amount of multipath in indoor, urban and
suburban environments?
10. What is the maximum multipath distance for the main
technologies?
11. What id shadow fading?

3
Multipath Fading
• A major impairment of the received signal is caused by multipath, which can be
constructive or destructive, as signals arrive out of phase and may enhance or
cancel each other
– The received signal is the result of the sum of many paths, in which the signal was
diffracted and reflected several times
• The designer should evaluate the possible multipaths in each deployment as an
understanding on how signals are attenuated and reflected is important to
properly characterize the RF channel
– Each of the received copies causes a phase shift on the signal, which is negligible if
the signal is small compared to the main one. Signals 10 dB below the main signal
should be discarded
Relative
Amplitude (dB)
0 dB
-10 dB
-20 dB
-30 dB
-40 dB
100 110 120 130 140 Time (ms)

3
Multipath Fading
• A difficulty that arises is to express a single multipath delay at a
certain point, due to the different amplitudes of each path
– As explained in the previously the phase of the resultant sinewave
can be calculated by power weighting the phase contribution of each
sine wave
– We can apply the same reasoning for the time delay
• The average value is then used to calculate the RMS value and this is
considered as the RMS delay spread
Main signal and multipath (90°) Main signal and multipath (135°) Main signal and multipath (180°)
1.5 1.5
1.5
1 1 1
0.5 0.5 0.5

Amplitude
Amplitude
Amplitude
0 0 0
0 200 400 600 0 200 400 600 0 200 400 600
-0.5 -0.5 -0.5
-1 -1
-1
-1.5 -1.5
Delay spread expressed in degrees -1.5
Delay spread expressed in degrees Delay spread expressed in degrees

3
Multipath Fading
• Figure on the right shows the resultant RMS power of a main sine wave and a
shifted copy of it, for a complete cycle of phase shifts, expressed in dB
– Shifts up to 120° do not have much impact on the resultant signal, thus the channels
can be considered flat within this range (about 1/3 of the cycle)
– Shifts between 120° and 240° are destructive (deep fading area)
– Larger shifts between 240° and 360° result in flat channels again
– The deep is very pronounced when both signals have the same amplitude. Figure on
the left shows the deep, when one signal has 50% of the amplitude of the main
signal
RMS power of the sum of main signal and its

multipath RMS power of the sum of main signal and its
20
20 15 multipath
15 10
Relative power to main signal (dB)
Relative power to main signal (dB)
10 5
5 0
0 -5 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220 240 260 280 300 320 340 360 380
-5 0 20 40 60 80 100120140160180200220240260280300320340360380 -10
-10 -15
-15 -20
-20 -25
-25 -30
-30
-35
-35
-40 -40
-45 -45
-50 -50
-55 -55
-60 -60
Delay spread expressed in degrees Delay spread expressed in degrees

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Multipath Fading
• There is little we can do to control the multipath in an environment, but we can
restrict the channel bandwidth, so it will not be seriously affected by the
multipath
• Table shows the extent of the fading distance (1/3 of the cycle) for different
bandwidths
• As shown in Table below, for OFDM, the 10 kHz subcarrier bandwidth tolerates
about 10,000 m of multipath; an UMTS system, however, with its 5,000 kHz
channel, only tolerates about 20 m. UMTS has, however, much more complex
equalization capabilities to try to compensate for this (it can equalize 5 to 6
symbols)
Bandwidth (kHz) 1 cycle (µs) 1/3 cycle (µs) 1/3 cycle (m)
1.0 1000 333.3 100,000
5.0 200 66.7 20,000
7.5 133 44.4 13,333
10.0 100 33.3 10,000
15.0 67 22.2 6,667
200 5 1.7 500
1,000 1.00 0.33 100
5,000 0.20 0.07 20
10,000 0.10 0.03 10
100,000 0.0100 0.0033 1.00
1,000,000 0.0010 0.0003 0.10
2,500,000 0.00040 0.00013 0.04
3,500,000 0.00029 0.00010 0.03
11/28/201 5,000,000 0.00020 0.00007 0.02
Copyright CelPlan Technolgoies, Inc. 3-35
3
Considerations about multipath
• For the carrier frequencies it is impossible to avoid fading, because the
multipath distance is very small, but a small position adjustment will
reposition the receiver outside the fading zone
• This is not true, however, for the lower modulating frequencies in which
distances involved are large
• Multipath fading effect impacts the whole band and its impact should be
considered on the same frequency and on different frequencies inside
the band.
– Same frequency signals are affected by the multipath length spread
(difference between the signal paths).
– Different frequency signals are affected by the whole path length, as each
frequency arrives with a different phase due to the whole path propagation.
This phase variation effect is deterministic and can be compensated by a
band equalizer
• It is possible to build channel equalizers, to counteract the effect of
multipath, but because it has a dynamic effect (varies with time), it is
difficult and expensive to implement. Ideally, the channel bandwidth
should be such that multipath can be avoided altogether, and this means
that the path propagation should be smaller than the multipath distance
(1/3 of the bandwidth cycle)
3
Multipath Avoidance
• As an example, assume a 3.5 GHz carrier with a channel bandwidth of 10
kHz
– In this case, the carrier has a fading distance of 30 cm, and its fading can be
adjusted by moving the receiver antenna a few centimeters
– The modulating frequency of 10 kHz allows providing service up to 10 km,
without significant multipath effect
– If a band frequency equalizer is used, a 10 km multipath spread can be
supported
• On the other extreme, a 1 MHz bandwidth can be used, but this reduces
our multipath to 100 m, which is too short distance even for the
multipath spread
Channel multipath avoidance maximum distance
1.00
Frequency (Mhz)
0.10
0.01
0.00
0.00 5,000.00 10,000.00 15,000.00 20,000.00 25,000.00
Distance (m)
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Coherence Bandwidth
• The duration of the path or multipath spread, whichever is more restrictive, is
called the coherence bandwidth and is defined by the inverse of this time
• In literature, the coherence bandwidth is expressed as the bandwidth for which
a full cycle shift occurs and is given by the first equation below
• The coherence bandwidth can then be expressed for 50% correlation between
end frequencies (the channel varies by 3 dB), or for 90% correlation (0.5 dB
channel variation) and is defined respectively by equations below
• The 1/3 cycle criteria can be used to define a flat channel, which corresponds to
a variation of about 6 dB and is defined by the equation with 25% correlation
• Where τ = delay spread for signals within a 10 dB window
𝐵𝑐 = 1 𝜎𝜏 Coherence Bandwidth
𝜎𝜏 = 𝜏2 − 𝜏2 RMS delay spread
𝐵𝑐,50% = 1 5𝜎𝜏 Coherence bandwidth 50% correlation

3
Coherence Bandwidth
• Multipath spread varies significantly from one area to another and
has to be evaluated by the designer on a case by case basis. Typical
design values are presented in Table on the right for different
scenarios
• The Table on the left gives the coherence bandwidth with 25%
correlation for several multipath distances
Multipath (km) Coherence Bandwidth (kHz)
Multipath 1 100
RMS Delay RMS Spread 2 50
Environment
Spread (ns) Distance (m) 4 25
Indoor ≤ 270 ≤ 81 6 17
Urban ≤ 2,100 ≤ 630 8 13
Suburban ≤ 3,500 ≤ 1,050 10 10
Rural ≤ 10,000 ≤ 3,000 12 8
14 7
16 6
18 6
20 5

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Coherence Bandwidth
• The ideal bandwidth is between 33 kHz and 2 kHz
• Small bandwidths are prone to frequency tolerance issues. Commercial
crystals can be obtained with a stability of 10-7, which represents a
deviation of 500 Hz at 5 GHz. The minimum bandwidth should be at least
20 times this limit (10 kHz)
• Table below presents the maximum multipath distance for the main
wireless technologies for the rural scenario of Table 5.7. Some
technologies extend this distance by using channel equalization
techniques
Maximum
Nominal Bandwidth
Technology Used Bandwidth (KHz) multipath
(kHz)
distance(m)
WIMAX 10.5 10 10,000

LTE 15.5 15 6,667
TDMA 30 12 8,333
GSM 200 160 625
CDMA 1500 1250 80
UMTS 5000 4500 22
3
Shadow Fading
• This fading is also known as long term fading and is caused by
morphology obstructions. When the first prediction models were
developed, shadow fading was a very important factor because the
predictions were done per distance (over a circle) and this factor
gave the variation over the circle
• Today predictions are done on a much smaller pixel basis, and the
shadow fading was reduced to express the variations inside a pixel.
Shadow fading distribution is considered log-normal, meaning that
its value in dB follows a Gaussian distribution
• Shadow fading can be measured in the field, during the
propagation model calibration process and depends on pixel size

3
RF Channel In Frequency Domain Summary
1. RF channel has frequency selective variations due to each
frequency being affected differently by multipath
2. It was estimated how different multipath spread affects different
frequencies
3. Constraints for a frequency flat channel were calculated
4. The concept of coherence bandwidth was introduced
5. A coherence bandwidth was calculated for different correlations
6. Typical multipaths for different environments were presented
7. Multipath spread tolerance was presented for the most common
technologies
8. Shadow fading was explained

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel
1. Multipath Fading
2. Shadow Fading
1. Wind Effect
2. Vehicles Effect
3. Doppler Effect
4. Fading Types
3
3.2 RF Channel in Time Domain
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RF Channel in Time Domain Topics
1. Why does an RF channel response change in time?
2. What are the effect that influence RF channel variation in time?
3. What effect does wind have on the channel response?
4. How do vehicles movement affect RF channel response?
5. How does Doppler effect influence RF channel response?
6. What is coherence time?
7. What is coherence time correlation?
8. What statistics apply to fading?
9. How fading can be mitigated?
10. What is the multipath resilience of the main technologies?

3
RF Channel in time Domain
• In a static environment, the multipath effect would be constant, and in a well
designed system the modulating frequency does not fade, which allows that a
carrier fading free spot can be easily found
– In real life the environment is never static and the fading pattern will be changing
with changes in the environment
• It is possible to adjust the system gain for changes between symbols, but
changes during one symbol period disrupt its correct detection.
– Channel variations cannot be reduced in time, but an adequate symbol size, shorter
than those variations can be chosen
• The variations in time domain are caused by movement of the receiver and
transmitter, or by changes in the environment
– These factors cause a change in the multipath components and, consequently, a
different fading pattern
– Changes of fading patterns over time are known as time selective fading
• To characterize changes in time, the speed of the elements (receiver,
transmitter, and environment) causing the changes has to be determined. This
section uses the term “relative speed” to describe this concept
– Cars, trees, and receiver movement are the major contributors to these changes.
This section explains how the channel is affected by fading due to the relative speed
of these elements

3
Wind Effect
• The wind causes trees to move impacting the relative speed of the system,
and, thus causing fading. This movement is relatively slow and varies with
the speed of the wind. Assuming a range of movement for the tree of 1
meter, the fading time can be calculated by equation below
• Table below correlates the expected fading durations to different wind
speeds
d =range of tree movement (m)
ν =speed of wind (m/s)
Ft =fading time (s)
𝑑
𝐹𝑡 = Fading time due to trees
ν
Trees Effect
Wind Speed (km/h) Wind Speed (m/s) Fading Time (ms)
10 2.778 360
5 1.389 720
1 0.278 3,600
0.1 0.028 36,000
0.01 0.003 360,000
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Vehicles Effect
• Vehicles reflect the signal on their sides and their speed
causes these reflections to impact fading differently. This
impact can be calculated by equation below
l=vehicle length (m)
ν=vehicle speed
Ft =fading time (s)
𝑑
𝐹𝑡 = Fading time due to vehicles
ν
Vehicle Movement Effect
Vehicle Vehicle Fading Time (ms)
Speed Speed 1 m long 4 m long
(km/h) (m/s) (car) (truck)

120 33.3 30 120
100 27.8 36 144
80 22.2 45 180
60 16.7 60 240
40 11.1 90 360
20 5.6 180 720
10 2.8 360 1,440
5 1.4 720 2,880
1 0.3 3,600 14,400
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Doppler Effect
• Movement of the receiver or transmitter causes a change in the perceived frequency
(Doppler Effect), resulting in a Doppler frequency shift that causes a phase slip, which,
over a certain number of cycles, builds up to a full cycle. Halfway through this time, the
system reaches an anti-phase (fading) and the signal is then built up again until reaching
the full cycle
– The time it takes for the initial slip to reach a full cycle slip is known as Coherence Time (Tc)
• The variation in the perceived frequency due to the Doppler Effect is expressed by
equation below
• Table below shows the Doppler Shift at various speeds for a frequency of 1 GHz, for a
receiver moving in the direction of the transmitter. The frequency shift is reduced if the
movement is not in the direction of the source
ν 𝑓ν
∆𝑓 = = Doppler frequency change
λ 𝑐
Doppler Shift
Relative Speed (km/h) Relative Speed (m/s) Δf (Hz)
120 33.3 111.1
100 27.8 92.6
80 22.2 74.1
60 16.7 55.6
40 11.1 37.0
20 5.6 18.5
10 2.8 9.3
5 1.4 4.6
1 0.3 0.9
0.1 0.0 0.1
0.01 0.0 0.01
3
Time Fading
• The frequency with which these variations happen can be calculated for each of the
different effects described in this section
– This allows the determination of the fastest changing cycle. Table on the left calculates this fading
frequency for a 1 GHz carrier based on different relative speeds of the system.
– In the table, N represents the number of cycles passed until the accumulated phase slip reaches 1
full cycle. Tc, or coherence time, is the period during which the phase shifts one period (360
degrees/ full cycle) due to the frequency shift caused by the Doppler Effect
– Because the Doppler shift varies with the wavelength, the coherence time also varies with the
frequency
• Table on the right calculates the Doppler Effect (coherence time) for different frequencies,
showing that the fading caused by it can vary from 3 ms to approximately 1 second
– The Doppler Effect inflicts most constraint on channel variation with time, which is 2 ms (for 5 GHz)
Relative Speed Δf (Hz) N (cycles) Coherence Time Doppler Effect
Relative Speed Coherence Time (ms)
(km/h) Tc (ms)
1 GHz 3 GHz 5 GHz
120 111.1 9.0E+06 9 (km/h)
100 92.6 1.1E+07 11 120 9 3 2
80 74.1 1.4E+07 14 100 11 3 2
60 55.6 1.8E+07 18
80 14 4 3
40 37.0 2.7E+07 27
60 18 5 4
20 18.5 5.4E+07 54
40 27 8 5
10 9.3 1.1E+08 108
5 4.6 2.2E+08 216 20 54 15 11
1 0.9 1.1E+09 1,080 10 108 31 22
0.1 0.1 1.1E+10 10,800 5 216 62 43
0.01 0.01 1.1E+11 108,000 1 1080 309 216
3
Coherence Time
• The coherence time is then defined by the first equation below
• In literature, we find variations between 0.179 and 0.423 as acceptable
limits of the coherence time
– Based on the findings presented previously for the coherence bandwidth, a
similar relationship can be assumed
• The coherence time can be expressed for 12.5% correlation between the
end frequencies (the channel varies by 12 dB), for 25% correlation (6 dB
variation), or 75% correlation (2dB variation) and is defined respectively
by equations below
1
𝑇𝑐 = Coherence time
∆𝑓
1
𝑇𝑐 = Coherence time for 12.5% correlation
2.5∆𝑓
1
𝑇𝑐 = Coherence time for 25% correlation
3 ∆𝑓
1
𝑇𝑐 = Coherence time for 75% correlation
6 ∆𝑓

3
Fade Statistics
• Fading occurrence can be measured by examining how often fading crosses a given
threshold (level), in what is known as level crossing rate. The approximate rate for
different fade severities at different speeds in a Rayleigh channel is defined by the first
equation below and typical values are shown in Table on the left
• The approximate fade duration for different severities at different speeds in a Rayleigh
channel is defined by the second equation below and typical values are shown in Table
on the right
𝑁𝑐 = 2𝜋∆𝑓𝜌2 Number of fading crossings
2
(1 − 𝑒 −𝜌 )
𝜏= Average Fade duration
𝑁𝑐
Level Crossings/second Fade Duration (µs)
Fade Intensity (dB) Fade Intensity (dB)
speed -3 -6 -10 -20 Speed (km/h) -3 -6 -10 -20
(km/h)
0.1 1 0 0 0 0.1 703,237 320,029 124,048 12,343
1 5 2 1 0
1 70,324 32,003 12,405 1,234
10 52 22 8 1
10 7,032 3,200 1,240 123
100 522 217 82 8 100 703 320 124 12
200 1,044 434 164 16 200 352 160 62 6
240 1,253 520 196 19 240 293 133 52 5
3
Fade Duration and Frequency
• Table below shows that individual fade duration decreases with increase
in speed; according to the previous table, however, the number of fades
increases with speed. This brings the sum of the fades to approximately
the same value for all speeds, varying only according to the fade severity
• Fading at low speeds and at high speeds is illustrated in figure on left and
figure on right respectively
Total Fade Duration (s)
Fade Intensity (dB)
-3 -6 -10 -20
Total Fade Duration (s) 0.3671 0.0694 0.0102 0.0001

3
Multipath Mitigation Techniques
• Multipath can be minimized by using some mitigation techniques:
– Use of directional antennas to reduce the amplitude of multipath signals.
– Analysis of possible reflectors to avoid pointing the antenna to them
– Use of diversity antennas and techniques

3
Comparing Multipath Resilience
• Table below shows that WiMAX and LTE support high speed and large delay
spread whereas other technologies have to trade speed by range
– The cell radius can be estimated from the distance spread by multiplying it by 3
• UMTS, HSPA, cdma and EVDO require band equalizers that can equalize up
to three symbols and consequently improve the multipath range three fold
Maximum Coherence
Maximum Theoretical
Multipath Time for 5
Symbol Theoretical Absolute Coherence
Bandwidth Highest Distance GHz 120
Technology duration Data Rate per Maximum Bandwidth
(MHz) Modulation Spread for km/h 75%
(us) Sub-Carrier Spectral (KHz)
75% correlation
(Mbps) Efficiency (bit/Hz)
correlation (m) (μs)
GSM/GPRS/EDGE 0.16 3.7 QPSK 0.54 3.38 370 270 666
UMTS 3.844 0.3 QPSK 7.69 2.00 26 3,846 666
HSDPA 3.844 0.3 16QAM 15.38 4.00 26 3,846 666
CDMA 1.288 0.8 QPSK 2.56 1.99 78 1,282 666
EVDO 1.288 0.8 16QAM 5.13 3.98 78 1,282 666
WLAN (Wi-Fi) 0.3125 3.2 64QAM 1.25 4.00 320 156 666
WiMAX (sub-carrier) 0.0105 95.2 64QAM 0.04 4.00 9,524 10 666
LTE (sub-carrier) 0.0155 64.5 64QAM 0.06 4.00 6,452 10 666

3
RF Channel in Time Domain Summary
• The effects that cause multipath variations over time were
analyzed
– Wind
– Vehicle movement
– Doppler effect (speed variation between transmit and receive)
• Coherence time was calculated for different coherence values
• Fade Statistics were analyzed
– Occurrence frequency
– Fading depth
• Main technologies resilience to fading was compared

3
Contents
2. The RF Signal
1. Signal Formation
2. Signal Spectrum
4. Signal Content
3. The RF Channel
1. Multipath Fading
2. Shadow Fading
1. Wind Effect
2. Vehicles Effect
3. Doppler Effect
4. Fading Types
3
3.3 RF Channel in Power Domain

RF Channel in Power Domain Topics
1. How does adaptive modulation affect the transmit power?
2. Do 4G technologies use downlink and uplink power control?
3. How do the different modulations distribute themselves with
distance?
4. What percentage of the area is covered by each modulation in an
unrestricted cell?

3
•
Power Control
Power level and power controls are two variables that can fundamentally impact the
efficiency of an Adaptive Modulation network
– Transmit power limits are regulated by local or national agencies, such as FCC in the United States;
however, it is important that it be adapted to the maximum power of the SS or MS devices to
provide a balanced link.
– Pilot and other control signals are usually BPSK modulated and boosted few dB (typically 2.5dB)
above the average value specified for other modulations
• SSs/MSs are classified according to distinct power classes: 20, 23, 27 and 30 dBm
• Power control is used in both the downstream and upstream with a dynamic range of up to
50 dB
• Figure below shows the variation of transmitted power with distance, for a 20 dB/decade
path loss. Distances displayed in the graph change significantly with the path loss slope
Power Control
35
Transmit Power (dBm)- max 30 dBm
30
25
20
15 64QAM1/2
10 64QAM5/6 16QAM3/4 QPSK3/4

5
64QAM3/4 16QAM1/2 QPSK1/2
0
-5 0 10000 20000 30000 40000 50000 60000
Distance (m) for 20 dB/decade path loss
3
Adaptive Modulation Relative Areas
• Unrestricted cell
• Propagation in free space: 20dB/decade
• Percentages will change if cells are closer to each other and lower
modulation schemes are not used
• Cell capacity drops with the increase in cell size

3
RF Channel in Power Domain Summary
1. Power control is used by 4G technologies in both directions, but
its effect is less pronounced than in traditional technologies
2. Cell changes modulation scheme when there is power available
3. Cell are transmitting close to the its full power the majority of the
time
4. Cell throughput depends on the cell size and traffic distribution

3
Thank You!
CelPlan Technologies

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3.

Frequency Selective Fading

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Spectrum of a phase modulated carrier

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𝐹 𝑤 = 𝑇 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑐 (𝑤𝑇/2) Pulse Spectrum

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𝑠 = 𝑠 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝜑 + 𝑖 𝑠 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝜑 = Transmitted Sinusoid

𝑟 = 𝑟 𝑐𝑜𝑠𝜑 + 𝑖 𝑟 𝑠𝑖𝑛𝜑 = 𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝜑 Received Sinusoid Tim

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100 110 120 130 140 Time (ms)

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0.5 0.5 0.5

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RMS power of the sum of main signal and its

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𝜎𝜏 = 𝜏2 − 𝜏2 RMS delay spread

𝐵𝑐,50% = 1 5𝜎𝜏 Coherence bandwidth 50% correlation

𝐵𝑐,50% = 1 50𝜎𝜏 Coherence bandwidth 90% correlation

𝐵𝑐,50% = 1 3𝜎𝜏 Coherence bandwidth 25% correlation

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WIMAX 10.5 10 10,000

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(km/h) (m/s) (car) (truck)

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GSM/GPRS/EDGE 0.16 3.7 QPSK 0.54 3.38 370 270 666

UMTS 3.844 0.3 QPSK 7.69 2.00 26 3,846 666

HSDPA 3.844 0.3 16QAM 15.38 4.00 26 3,846 666

CDMA 1.288 0.8 QPSK 2.56 1.99 78 1,282 666

EVDO 1.288 0.8 16QAM 5.13 3.98 78 1,282 666

WiMAX (sub-carrier) 0.0105 95.2 64QAM 0.04 4.00 9,524 10 666

LTE (sub-carrier) 0.0155 64.5 64QAM 0.06 4.00 6,452 10 666

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