Unit One

Wireless Communication

1 Cellular systems
Cellular systems for mobile communications implement SDM (Space-
Division Multiplexing). Each transmitter, typically called a base station,
covers a certain area, a cell. Cell radii can vary from tens of meters in
buildings, and hundreds of meters in cities, up to tens of kilometers in the
countryside. The shape of cells are never perfect circles or hexagons (as
shown in Figure 1.1), but depend on the environment (buildings,
mountains, valleys etc.), on weather conditions, and sometimes even on
system load. Typical systems using this approach are mobile
telecommunication systems, where a mobile station within the cell around
a base station communicates with this base station and vice versa.

Figure 1.1: Cellular system with three and seven cell clusters.

In this context, the question arises as to why mobile network

providers install several thousands of base stations throughout a
country (which is quite expensive) and do not use powerful
transmitters with huge cells like, e.g., radio stations, use.

Advantages of cellular systems with small cells are the following:

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● Higher capacity: Implementing SDM allows frequency reuse. If one
transmitter is far away from another, i.e., outside the interference range, it
can reuse the same frequencies. As most mobile phone systems assign
frequencies to certain users (or certain hopping patterns), this frequency
is blocked for other users. But frequencies are a scarce resource and, the
number of concurrent users per cell is very limited. Huge cells do not
allow for more users. On the contrary, they are limited to less possible
users per km2. This is also the reason for using very small cells in cities
where many more people use mobile phones.

● Less transmission power: While power aspects are not a big problem
for base stations, they are indeed problematic for mobile stations. A
receiver far away from a base station would need much more transmit
power than the current few Watts. But energy is a serious problem for
mobile handheld
devices.

● Local interference only: Having long distances between sender and

receiver results in even more interference problems. With small cells,
mobile stations and base stations only have to deal with ‘local’
interference.

● Robustness: Cellular systems are decentralized and so, more robust

against the failure of single components. If one antenna fails, this only
influences communication within a small area.

Small cells also have some disadvantages:

● Infrastructure needed: Cellular systems need a complex infrastructure

to connect all base stations. This includes many antennas, switches for
call forwarding, location registers to find a mobile station etc, which
makes the whole system quite expensive.

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Handover needed: The mobile station has to perform a handover when
changing from one cell to another. Depending on the cell size and the
speed of movement, this can happen quite often.

● Frequency planning: To avoid interference between transmitters using

the same frequencies, frequencies have to be distributed carefully. On the
one hand, interference should be avoided, on the other, only a limited
number of frequencies is available.

To avoid interference, different transmitters within each other’s

interference range use FDM. If FDM is combined with TDM (see Figure
2.19), the hopping pattern has to be coordinated. The general goal is
never to use the same frequency at the same time within the interference
range (if CDM is not applied). Two possible models to create cell
patterns with minimal interference are shown in Figure 1.1. Cells are
combined in clusters – on the left side three cells form a cluster, on the
right side seven cells form a cluster. All cells within a cluster use
disjointed sets of frequencies. On the left side, one cell in the cluster uses
set f1, another cell f2, and the third cell f3. In real-life transmission, the
pattern will look somewhat different. The hexagonal pattern is chosen as
a simple way of illustrating the model. This pattern also shows the
repetition of the same frequency sets. The transmission power of a sender
has to be limited to avoid interference with the next cell using the same
frequencies. To reduce interference even further (and under certain traffic
conditions, i.e., number of users per km2) sectorized antennas can be
used. Figure 1.2 shows the use of three sectors per cell in a cluster with
three cells. Typically, it makes sense to use sectorized antennas instead of
omni-directional antennas for larger cell radii.

The fixed assignment of frequencies to cell clusters and cells

respectively, is not very efficient if traffic load varies. For instance, in the
case of a heavy load in one cell and a light load in a neighboring cell, it
could make sense to ‘borrow’ frequencies. Cells with more traffic are
dynamically allotted more frequencies. This scheme is known as

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borrowing channel allocation (BCA), while the first fixed scheme is
called fixed channel allocation (FCA). FCA is used in the GSM system
as it is much simpler to use, but it requires careful traffic analysis before
installation. A dynamic channel allocation (DCA) scheme has been
implemented in DECT (Digital enhanced cordless telecommunications).
In this scheme, frequencies can only be borrowed, but it is also possible
to freely assign frequencies to cells. With dynamic assignment of
frequencies to cells, the danger of interference with cells using the same
frequency exists. The ‘borrowed’ frequency can be blocked in the
surrounding cells.

Figure 1.2: Cellular system with three cell clusters and three sectors per
cell

Cellular systems using CDM instead of FDM do not need such elaborate
channel allocation schemes and complex frequency planning. Here, users
are separated through the code they use, not through the frequency. Cell
planning faces another problem – the cell size depends on the current
load. Accordingly, CDM cells are commonly said to ‘breathe’. While a
cell can cover a larger area under a light load, it shrinks if the load
increases. The reason for this is the growing noise level if more users are
in a cell. (Remember, if you do not know the code, other signals appear
as noise, i.e., more and more people join the party.) The higher the noise,
the higher the path loss and the higher the transmission errors. Finally,
mobile stations further away from the base station drop out of the cell.
(This is similar to trying to talk to someone far away at a crowded party.)
Figure 1.3 illustrates this phenomenon with a user transmitting a high bit
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rate stream within a CDM cell. This additional user lets the cell shrink
with the result that two users drop out of the cell. In a real-life scenario
this additional user could request a video stream (high bit rate) while the
others use standard voice communication (low bit rate).

Figure 1.3: Cell breathing depending on the current load

2 Roaming or Handoff
Handoff is the procedure for changing the assignment of a mobile unit
from one BS to another as the mobile unit moves from one cell to
another. Handoff is handled in different ways in different systems and
involves a number of factors. Here we give a brief overview.
Handoff may be network initiated, in which the decision is made solely
by the network measurements of received signals from the mobile unit.
Alternatively, mobile unit assisted handoff schemes enable the mobile
unit to participate in the handoff decision by providing feedback to the
network concerning signals received at the mobile unit. In either case, a
number of different performance metrics may be used to make the
decision. As shown in the following:
1. Cell blocking probability: The probability of a new call being
blocked, due to heavy load on the BS traffic capacity. In this case,
the mobile unit is handed off to a neighboring cell based not on
signal quality but on traffic capacity.
2. Call dropping probability: The probability that, due to a handoff, a
call is terminated.

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 3. Call completion probability: The probability that an admitted call is
not dropped before it terminates.
4. Probability of unsuccessful handoff: The probability that a handoff
is executed while the reception conditions are inadequate.
5. Handoff blocking probability: The probability that a handoff
cannot be successfully completed.
6. Handoff probability: The probability that a handoff occurs before
call termination.
7. Rate of handoff: The number of handoffs per unit time.

The handoffs are of following types:

1. Hard Handoff
2. Soft Handoff
3. Queued Handoff
4. Delayed Handoff
5. Intersystem Handoff
6. Intrasystem Handoff
7. Network controlled Handoff (NCHO)
8. Mobile Assisted Handoff (MAHO)

3 Cellular Wireless Networks

3.1 Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA) is used for allocating a

separated space to users in wireless networks. A typical application
involves assigning an optimal base station to a mobile phone user. The
mobile phone may receive several base stations with different quality.
3.2 Frequency division multiple access (FDMA) comprises all
algorithms allocating frequencies to transmission channels according to
the frequency division multiplexing (FDM) scheme. Allocation can
either be fixed (as for radio stations or the general planning and
regulation of frequencies) or dynamic (i.e., demand driven).
3.3 Time division multiple access (TDMA)
Compared to FDMA, time division multiple access (TDMA) offers a
much more flexible scheme, which comprises all technologies that
allocate certain time slots for communication, i.e., controlling TDM.
3.4 Code division multiple access (CDMA)
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Finally, codes with certain characteristics can be applied to the
transmission to enable the use of code division multiplexing (CDM).
Code division multiple access (CDMA) systems use exactly these codes
to separate different users in code space and to enable access to a shared
medium without interference. The main problem is how to find “good”
codes and how to separate the signal from noise generated by other
signals and the environment.
Table 1.1 Comparison of SDMA, TDMA,
FDMA, and CDMA Mechanisms