APPLICATIONS OF PHASE MODULATION

Abstract: An Introductory or initial report

on the applications of phase modulation,
the topic of the term paper for the current I.
II. INTRODUCTION TO THE TOPIC
3rd semester.

wave to be radiated in order to

increase the radiation efficiency.
Modulation:-
3) Mutual interference:- The
It is defined as the process of alternating some of
frequency of noises such as
the characteristics such as amplitude, frequency or
thermal noises and
phase angle of the carrier signal of higher frequency
electromagnetic noises lies in the
in accordance with the low frequency modulating
range of audible frequency so it
signal.
can be easily interfered by these
noises. When we modulate It over
a carrier signal its frequency
increases and thus it becomes
Carrier wave:- immune to noises.

It is a high frequency constant amplitude and non 4) Huge antenna requirement:-

interrupted wave generated by radio frequency For efficient radiation of signal
oscillator these waveforms are inaudible it means the length of transmitting and
we can’t listen these radio waveforms even through receiving antenna should be at
loud speakers. least one quarter of the wave
length that is
l=1/4(velocity/ frequency (hz))
so we see that the length of
the antenna is inversely
Need of modulation:- Low frequency signals can’t
proportional to the frequency of
be transmitted over long distances if radiated
modulating signal thus high
directly in space because of interference with
frequency of modulated signal
similar frequency range waveforms . We require
leads to small length of antenna
modulation because of following reasons
and vice versa.

1) Short operating range:- The Types of modulation:-

energy of any wave depends
upon its frequency so larger the
frequency of the wave the greater Modulation is mainly done in three ways:-
the energy associated with it. For
small signal frequency power is
lower so it can be transmitted
over large distances. 1) Amplitude modulation(AM):-In
amplitude modulation the
2) Poor radiation efficiency:- At amplitude of the carrier signal is
audible frequency the radiation varied in accordance with the
efficiency is poor so we require to modulating signal .Example is
increase the frequency of the shown below

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 3) Phase modulation(PM):- In
phase modulation the phase
angle of the carrier signal is
varied in accordance with the
modulating signal .The diagram is
shown below

2) Frequency Modulation (FM):- In

frequency modulation the
frequency of the carrier signal is
varied in accordance with
modulating signal. Example is
shown below

Modulating Index (m):-

It is the ratio of the extent by which the amplitude,

frequency or phase angle of the carrier wave is
varied to its original amplitude, frequency or phase
angle when the carrier waveform is unmodulated .It
is expressed in percentage.

Now we come to our main topic ”phase modulation”

The question arises, What is phase modulation???

Answer to this is that like frequency modulation,

phase modulation is also a technique of modulation
in which information is represented as variation in
the instantaneous phase of the carrier wave.

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It would become more clear from the following
example-
The phase of a wave is a specific point or
benchmark along that wave. A phase shift is an
observable repositioning of this benchmark
Let us consider that signal which we want to send is between successive transmissions. A pulse
represented by s(t) and carrier on which signal is to Doppler radar, in its simplest form, provides a
be modulated is represented by reference signal by which

changes in the frequency phase of successively

received pulses may be recognized. The known
c(t)=Ac sin (ωct +Фc) phase of the transmitted signal allows measurement
of the phase of the received signal. The Doppler
shift associated with the echo from which the
return originated is calculated from the time rate of
thus the modulated signal comes out to be
change of phase. The phase of a wave, measured
in degrees, where 360 degrees equals one
c(t)=Ac sin (ωct +s(t)+Фc) wavelength, indicates the current position of the
wave relative to a reference position. For example,
look at figure 2-18. At time T1 (fig. 2-18, view A),
this shows that how the phase of the carrier wave is the position of the wave along the vertical line was
modulated according to signal which is to be sent. as shown, while at time T2 (fig. 2-18, view B), the
position of the wave along the vertical line was as
shown. Notice that the wavelength did not change
from T1 to T2. However, the wave’s position relative
In phase modulation there are 2 regions of to the vertical line changed 1/4 wavelength, or 90
particular interest: degrees. This change is the phase shift.

1) For small amplitude signals, PM

is similar to amplitude modulation
(AM) and exhibits its unfortunate
doubling of baseband bandwidth
and poor efficiency.
2) For a single large sinusoidal
signal, PM is similar to FM, and
its bandwidth is approximately
2(m+1)fm
where fm= ωm /2π and m is the
modulation index.

Phase modulation is similar in practice to frequency

modulation (FM). When the instantaneous phase of
a carrier is varied, the instantaneous frequency
changes as well. The converse also holds: When
the instantaneous frequency is varied, the
instantaneous phase changes. But PM and FM are
not exactly equivalent, especially in analog
applications. When an FM receiver is used to
demodulate a PM signal, or when an FM signal is
intercepted by a receiver designed for PM, the
audio is distorted. This is because the relationship
between phase and frequency variations is not
linear; that is, phase and frequency do not vary in
direct proportion.

Phase shift or phase shifting:- Modulation index:-

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The modulation index of a phase modulated carrier keying (PSK). It uses two phases which are
wave is given by separated by 180° and so can also be termed 2-
PSK. It does not particularly matter exactly where
the constellation points are positioned, and in this
m=ΔƟ figure they are shown on the real axis, at 0° and
180°. This modulation is the most robust of all the
where ΔƟ is the peak phase PSKs since it takes the highest level of noise or
deviation. distortion to make the demodulator reach an
incorrect decision. It is, however, only able to
modulate at 1 bit/symbol (as seen in the figure) and
so is unsuitable for high data-rate applications when
Phase shift keying:- bandwidth is limited.

it is the digital version of phase modulation. It

conveys data by changing, or modulating, the
phase of a reference signal (the carrier wave).

Any digital modulation scheme uses a finite number

of distinct signals to represent digital data. PSK
uses a finite number of phases, each assigned a
unique pattern of binary bits. Usually, each phase
encodes an equal number of bits. Each pattern of
bits forms the symbol that is represented by the
particular phase. The demodulator, which is
designed specifically for the symbol-set used by the
modulator, determines the phase of the received
signal and maps it back to the symbol it represents,
thus recovering the original data. This requires the
receiver to be able to compare the phase of the
received signal to a reference signal — such a
system is termed coherent (and referred to as
CPSK).

Quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK):-

Alternatively, instead of using the bit patterns to set

the phase of the wave, it can instead be used to
change it by a specified amount. The demodulator Sometimes known as quaternary or quadriphase
then determines the changes in the phase of the PSK, 4-PSK, or 4-QAM[6], QPSK uses four points
received signal rather than the phase itself. Since on the constellation diagram, equispaced around a
this scheme depends on the difference between circle. With four phases, QPSK can encode two bits
successive phases, it is termed differential phase- per symbol, shown in the diagram with Gray coding
shift keying (DPSK). DPSK can be significantly to minimize the BER — twice the rate of BPSK.
simpler to implement than ordinary PSK since there Analysis shows that this may be used either to
is no need for the demodulator to have a copy of double the data rate compared to a BPSK system
the reference signal to determine the exact phase of while maintaining the bandwidth of the signal or to
the received signal (it is a non-coherent scheme). In maintain the data-rate of BPSK but halve the
exchange, it produces more erroneous bandwidth needed.
demodulations. The exact requirements of the
particular scenario under consideration determine
which scheme is used.

Applications of phase modulation:

Binary phase-shift keying (BPSK):-

1) Phase modulation is used in Wireless
technology:-

BPSK (also sometimes called PRK, Phase Reversal The wireless LAN standard, IEEE 802.11b, uses a
Keying, or 2PSK) is the simplest form of phase shift variety of different PSKs depending on the data-rate

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 required. At the basic-rate of 1 Mbit/s, it uses Bluetooth 2 will use π / 4-DQPSK at its lower rate (2
DBPSK (differential BPSK). To provide the Mbit /s) and 8-DPSK at its higher rate (3 Mbit /s)
extended-rate of 2 Mbit/s, DQPSK is used. In when the link between the two devices is sufficiently
reaching 5.5 Mbit/s and the full-rate of 11 Mbit/s, robust. Bluetooth 1 modulates with Gaussian
QPSK is employed, but has to be coupled with minimum-shift keying, a binary scheme, so either
complementary code keying. modulation choice in version 2 will yield a higher
data-rate. A similar technology, IEEE 802.15.4 (the
wireless standard used by Zig Bee) also relies on
The higher-speed wireless LAN standard, IEEE 802.11g has PSK. IEEE 802.15.4 allows the use of two
eight data rates: 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48 and 54 frequency bands: 868–915 MHz using BPSK and at
Mbit/s. The 6 and 9 Mbit/s modes use OFDM 2.4 GHz using OQPSK.
modulation where each sub-carrier is BPSK
modulated. The 12 and 18 Mbit/s modes use
OFDM with QPSK. The fastest four modes use
OFDM with forms of quadrature amplitude 2) Phase modulation is also used in signal
modulation. transmission system in army . It helps to transmit
video signal along with the audio signal. Thus
Because of its simplicity BPSK is phase modulation is used in communication system
appropriate for low-cost passive transmitters, and by army by making the use of special receiver
is used in RFID standards such as ISO/IEC 14443 devices which can receive and demodulate both
which has been adopted for biometric passports, audio and video signal simultaneously.
credit cards and many other applications.