WIRELESS COMMUNICATION

MODULE 4 - MULTIPLE ACCESS TECHNIQUES

MODULE 4_PART 3_Multiple access

Multiuser Systems
 In multiuser systems the system resources must be divided among
multiple users.
Multiuser Channels: The Uplink and Downlink
 A multiuser channel refers to any channel that must be shared among
multiple users.
 There are two different types of multiuser channels: the uplink
channel and the downlink channel
 A downlink, also called a broadcast channel or forward channel, has
one transmitter sending to many receivers.
 Since the signals transmitted to all users originate from the downlink
transmitter, the transmitted signal with total
power P and bandwidth B, is the sum of signals transmitted to all K
users.
 Thus, the total signaling dimensions and power of the transmitted
signal must be divided among the different users.
 Synchronization of the different users is relatively easy in the
downlink since all signals originate from the same transmitter,
although multipath in the channel can corrupt this synchronization.
 Another important characteristic of the
downlink is that both signal and
interference are distorted by the same channel.
 This is a fundamental difference between
the uplink and the downlink, since in the
uplink signals from different users are
distorted by different channels.
 Examples of wireless downlinks include
all radio and television broadcasting, the
transmission link from a satellite to
multiple ground stations, and the
transmission link from a base station to
the mobile terminals in a cellular system.
 An uplink channel, also called a multiple access channel or reverse channel, has many transmitters sending
signals to one receiver, where each signal must be within the total system bandwidth B.

 However, in contrast to the downlink, in the uplink each user has an individual power constraint Pk
associated with its transmitted signal sk(t).

 In addition, since the signals are sent from different transmitters, these transmitters must coordinate if
signal synchronization is required.

 Figure also indicates that the signals of the different users in the uplink travel through different channels, so
even if the transmitted powers Pk are the same, the received powers associated with the different users will
be different if their channel gains are different.

 Examples of wireless uplinks include laptop wireless LAN cards transmitting to a wireless LAN access
point, transmissions from ground stations to a satellite, and transmissions from mobile terminals to a base
station in cellular systems.
 Most communication systems are bi-directional, and hence consist of both
uplinks and downlinks.
 The radio transceiver that sends to users over a downlink channel and receives
from these users over an uplink channel is often refered to as an access point or
base station.
 It is generally not possible for radios to receive and transmit on the same
frequency band due to the interference that results.
 Thus, bi-directional systems must separate the uplink and downlink channels into
orthogonal signaling dimensions, typically using time or frequency dimensions.
 This separation is called duplexing.
 Multiple access schemes are used to allow many mobile users
to share simultaneously a finite amount of radio spectrum.
 Duplexing is needed to allow subscribers send and receive

information simultaneously.
e.g., Telephone systems,
 Duplexing

 Using frequency or time domain techniques.

 Frequency division duplexing (FDD)

 Provides two distinct bands of frequencies for every user.

 Forward band----from the base station to the mobile
 Reverse band----from the mobile to the base.
 Consists of two simplex channels

 Duplexer is used
 The frequency split between the forward and reverse channel is constant.
 Time division duplexing (TDD)
 Uses time to provide both a forward and reverse link.
 If the time split between the forward and reverse time slot is small, then the
transmission and reception of data appears simultaneous.
 Allows communication on a single channel and simplifies the subscriber
equipment since a duplexer is not required.
 Multiple Access

 Three major techniques:

 Frequency division multiple access (FDMA)
 Time division multiple access (TDMA)
 Code division multiple access (CDMA)

 These techniques can be grouped as narrowband and wideband

systems, depending upon how the available bandwidth is allocated to
the users.
 The duplexing technique of a multiple access system is usually described
along with the particular multiple access scheme
 Efficient allocation of signaling dimensions between users is a key design
aspect of both uplink and downlink channels, since bandwidth is usually
scarce and/or very expensive.
 When dedicated channels are allocated to users it is often called multiple
access.
 Multiple access techniques divide up the total signaling dimensions into
channels and then assign these channels to different users.
 The most common methods to divide up the signal space are along the
time, frequency, and/or code axes.
 The different user channels are then created by an orthogonal or non-
orthogonal division along these axes:
 time-division multiple access (TDMA) and frequency-division multiple
access (FDMA) are orthogonal channelization methods whereas code-
division multiple access (CDMA) can be orthogonal or non-orthogonal,
depending on the code design.
Frequency-Division Multiple Access
(FDMA)
 In FDMA the system signaling
dimensions are divided along the
frequency axis into non-overlapping
channels, and each user is assigned a
different frequency channel, as shown
in Figure.
 The channels often have guard bands between them to compensate for
imperfect filters, adjacent channel interference, and spectral spreading due
to Doppler.
 If the channels are sufficiently narrowband then even if the total system
bandwidth is large, the individual channels will not experience frequency-
selective fading.
 Transmission is continuous over time, which can complicate overhead
functions such as channel estimation since these functions must be
performed simultaneously and in the same bandwidth as data transmission.
 FDMA also requires frequency-agile radios that can tune to the different
carriers associated with the different channels.
 It is difficult to assign multiple channels to the same user under FDMA,
since this requires the radios to simultaneously demodulate signals
received over multiple frequency channels.
 FDMA is the most common multiple access option for analog
communication systems, where transmission is continuous, and serves as
the basis for the AMPS and ETACS analog cellular phone standards.
The features of FDMA:

 The FDMA channel carries only one phone circuit at a time.

 If an FDMA channel is not in use, then it sits idle and cannot be used by other users to
increase or share capacity. It is essentially a wasted resource.

 After the assignment of a voice channel, the base station and the mobile transmit
simultaneously and continuously.

 The bandwidths of FDMA channels are relatively narrow (30 kHz) as each channel supports
only one circuit per carrier. That is, FDMA is usually implemented in narrowband systems.

 The symbol time is large as compared to the average delay spread. This implies that the
amount of intersymbol interference is low and, thus, little or no equalization is required in
FDMA narrowband systems.
The features of FDMA (continued):

 The complexity of FDMA mobile systems is lower when compared to TDMA systems,
though this is changing as digital signal processing methods improve for TDMA.

 Since FDMA is a continuous transmission scheme, fewer bits are needed for
overhead purposes (such as synchronization and framing bits) as compared to
TDMA.

 FDMA systems have higher cell site system costs as compared to TDMA systems,
because of the single channel per carrier design, and the need to use costly bandpass
filters to eliminate spurious radiation at the base station.

 The FDMA mobile unit uses duplexers since both the transmitter and receiver operate
at the same time. This results in an increase in the cost of FDMA subscriber units and
base stations.

 FDMA requires tight RF filtering to minimize adjacent channel interference.

 Nonlinear Effects in FDMA:
 In FDMA, Many channels share the same antenna at the base station.

 The power amplifiers or the power combiners, when operated at or near saturation for maximum
power efficiency, are nonlinear.

 The nonlinearities cause signal spreading in the frequency domain and generate intermodulation
(IM) frequencies.
interfere adjacent-channels, or adjacent services
 Intermodulation distortion products occur at frequencies mf1 + nf2 for all integer values of m and n.
 Some of the possible intermodulation frequencies that are produced by a nonlinear device are
(2n+1)f -2𝑛𝑓 , (2n+2)𝑓 -(2n+1)𝑓 , (2n+1)𝑓 -2n𝑓 , (2n+2)𝑓 -(2n+1)𝑓 , etc. for n = 0, 1, 2, ……
 Problems (FDMA)…
20

Q) If the total spectrum allocation Bt = 12.5 MHz, guard band allocated

at the edge of the spectrum Bguard is 10kHz and the channel bandwidth
Bc is 30kHz, find the number of channels available in an FDMA system.
SOLUTION:

= 12.5 Mhz – 2*10 kHz/ 30 kHz

= 416
 Problems (FDMA)
21

Q) First-generation analog systems were allocated a total bandwidth of B = 25

MHz for uplink channels and another B = 25 MHz for downlink channels.
This bandwidth allocation was split between two operators in every region, so
each operator had 12.5 MHz for both their uplink and downlink channels.
Each user was assigned Bc = 30 kHz of spectrum for its analog voice signal,
corresponding to 24 kHz for the FM modulated signal with 3-kHz guard bands
on each side. The total uplink and downlink bandwidths also required guard
bands of Bg = 10 kHz on each side in order to mitigate interference to and
from adjacent systems. Find the total number of analog voice users that could
be supported in the total 25 MHz of bandwidth allocated to the uplink and the
downlink. Also consider a more efficient digital system, with high-level
modulation (so that only 10-kHz channels are required for a digital voice
signal) and with tighter filtering (so that only 5-kHz guard bands are
required on the band edges). How many users can be supported in the same
25 MHz of spectrum for this more efficient digital system?
 Problems (FDMA)…
22

SOLUTION:
The total bandwidth required for either the uplink or downlink is NBc +
2Bg for N users.
∗
Therefore the number of users, N = = = 832
This mean 832 users per operator.
In the case of the digital system,
∗
N= = = 2499
Time-Division Multiple Access (TDMA)

 In TDMA the system dimensions are divided

along the time axis into non-overlapping
channels, and each user is assigned a different
cyclically-repeating timeslot, as shown in Figure
 These TDMA channels occupy the entire system bandwidth, which is typically
wideband, so some form of ISI mitigation is required.
 The cyclically repeating timeslots imply that transmission is not continuous for any
user.
 Therefore, digital transmission techniques which allow for buffering are required.
 The fact that transmission is not continuous simplifies overhead functions such as
channel estimation, since these functions can be done during the timeslots
occupied by other users.
 TDMA also has the advantage that it is simple to assign multiple channels to a
single user by simply assigning him multiple timeslots.
 TDMA channels therefore often have guard bands between them to
compensate for synchronization errors and multipath.
 Another difficulty of TDMA is that with cyclically repeating timeslots the
channel characteristics change on each cycle.
 Thus, receiver functions that require channel estimates, like equalization,
must re-estimate the channel on each cycle.
 When transmission is continuous, the channel can be tracked, which is more
efficient. TDMA is used in the GSM, PDC, IS-54, and IS-136 digital cellular
phone standards
Features of TDMA:

 TDMA shares a single carrier frequency with several users, where each user makes use of
nonoverlapping time slots. The number of time slots per frame depends on several factors, such
as modulation technique, available bandwidth, etc.

 Data transmission for users of a TDMA system is not continuous, but occurs in bursts. This
results in low battery consumption, since the subscriber transmitter can be turned off when not in
use (which is most of the time).

 Because of discontinuous transmissions in TDMA, the handoff process is much simpler for a
subscriber unit, since it is able to listen for other base stations during idle time slots. An
enhanced link control, such as that provided by mobile assisted handoff (MAHO) can be carried
out by a subscriber by listening on an idle slot in the TDMA frame.

 TDMA uses different time slots for transmission and reception, thus duplexers are not required.
Even if FDD is used, a switch rather than a duplexer inside the subscriber unit is all that is
required to switch between transmitter and receiver using TDMA.
Features of TDMA (continued):

 Adaptive equalization is usually necessary in TDMA systems, since the transmission rates are
generally very high as compared to FDMA channels.

 In TDMA, the guard time should be minimized. If the transmitted signal at the edges of a time slot are
suppressed sharply in order to shorten the guard time, the transmitted spectrum will expand and
cause interference to adjacent channels.

 High synchronization overhead is required in TDMA systems because of burst transmissions. TDMA
transmissions are slotted, and this requires the receivers to be synchronized for each data burst. In
addition, guard slots are necessary to separate users, and this results in the TDMA systems having
larger overheads as compared to FDMA.

 TDMA has an advantage in that it is possible to allocate different numbers of time slots per frame to
different users. Thus bandwidth can be supplied on demand to different users by concatenating or
reassigning time slots based on priority.
Efficiency of TDMA:

 The frame efficiency, is the percentage of bits per frame which

contain transmitted data.

It is a measure of the percentage of transmitted data that contains

information as opposed to providing overhead for the access
scheme.
 The transmitted data may include source and channel coding bits, so
the raw end-user efficiency of a system is generally less than frame
efficiency.

Number of channels In TDMA system:

 Can be found by multiplying the number of TDMA slots per
channel by the number of channels available
 Problems (TDMA)
29

Q) The original GSM design uses 25 MHz of bandwidth for the uplink and for the downlink, the same
as AMPs. This bandwidth is divided into 125 TDMA channels of 200 kHz each. Each TDMA channel
consists of eight user timeslots; the eight timeslots along with a preamble and trailing bits form a
frame, which is cyclically repeated in time. Find the total number of users that can be supported in the
GSM system and the channel bandwidth of each user. If the root mean square delay spread of the
channel is 10 μs, will intersymbol interference mitigation be needed in this system?
SOLUTION:
The total number of users that can be supported = 125 * 8 = 1000
Channel bandwidth of each user = 200 kHz
Coherence bandwidth= =1/10μs = 100 kHz
Since channel bandwidth >> coherence bandwidth ( , it experiences frequency selective
fading  ISI mitigation is needed.
Code-Division Multiple Access (CDMA)
 In CDMA the information signals of
different users are modulated by orthogonal
or non-orthogonal spreading codes.
 The resulting spread signals simultaneously

occupy the same time and bandwidth, as

shown in Figure
 In CDMA, the narrowband message signal is multiplied by a very large
bandwidth signal called the spreading signal.
 The spreading signal is a pseudo-noise code sequence that has a chip rate
which is orders of magnitudes greater than the data rate of the message.
 All users use the same carrier frequency and may transmit simultaneously
 Each user has its own pseudorandom codeword which is approximately orthogonal to
all other code words.

 The receiver uses the spreading code structure to separate out the
different users. The most common form of CDMA is multiuser spread
spectrum with either Direct Sequence or Frequency Hopping.
 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)

 The receiver performs a time correlation operation to detect only the

specific desired codeword.
All other codewords appear as noise due to decorrelation.
 The receiver needs to know the codeword used by the
transmitter.
Each user operates independently with no knowledge of the other
users.
 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)
Near-far problem:
 The near-far problem occurs when many mobile users share the same
channel.
 A mobile station that is close to a base station and another mobile
station that is far from the base station both attempt to interact with
the base station at the same time, which is known as the near-far
problem in CDMA.
 The signal from the mobile station that is near the base station may be
significantly stronger than the signal from the mobile station that is far
away, which can lead to the loss or significant degradation of the signal
from the far mobile station.
 Reduced network bandwidth and coverage may follow from this.
 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)
Power control:
 Provided by each base station in a cellular system and assures that each mobile
within the base station coverage area provides the same signal level to the base
station receiver.
This solves the problem of a nearby subscriber overpowering the base station
receiver and drowning out the signals of far away subscribers.
 Power control is implemented at the base station by rapidly sampling the radio
signal strength indicator (RSSI) levels of each mobile and then sending a power
change command over the forward radio link.
out-of-cell mobiles provide interference which is not under the control of the
receiving base station.
 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)
Features of CDMA:

 Many users of a CDMA system share the same frequency. Either TDD or
FDD may be used.

 Multipath fading may be substantially reduced because the signal is spread

over a large spectrum. If the spread spectrum bandwidth is greater than the
coherence bandwidth of the channel, the inherent frequency diversity will
mitigate the effects of small-scale fading.
 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)

Features of CDMA (continued):

 Self-jamming is a problem in CDMA system. Self-jamming arises from the fact

that the spreading sequences of different users are not exactly orthogonal,
hence in the despreading of a particular PN code, non-zero contributions to the
receiver decision statistic for a desired user arise from the transmissions of
other users in the system.

 The near-far problem occurs at a CDMA receiver if an undesired user has a high
detected power as compared to the desired user.
 Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple
Access (OFDMA)
37

 OFDMA achieves multiple access by assigning different users disjoint sets of sub-
carriers.
 Assume that there are a total of M sub-carriers that are evenly distributed among Q
users, such that each user is allocated N = M/Q sub-carriers.
 The overall sub-carriers are labeled with indices from 0 to M - 1, while the N sub-
carriers allocated to the jth MS have indices that belong to the set Tj.
OFDM vs OFDMA

OFDM OFDMA

Orthogonal Frequency Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple

Division Multiplexing Access

Allows the transmission of Allows the transmission of high data rates

high data rates for a single for multiple users.
user
A channel access method that A channel access method that separates users in
separates users in time frequency domain
domain
All subcarriers are assigned to a Subcarriers are assigned to multiple users at a
single user at a time time

Static channel access method Dynamic channel access method

OFDMA

● A multiple access technique

● Achieves multiple access by assigning different
users disjoint sets of subcarriers.
● Assumptions
○ M subcarriers
○ Q users
○ N = M/Q ; number of subcarriers allotted to each user
● Two forms of OFDMA transmission
○ Forward link OFDMA : From base station to mobile
station
○ Reverse link OFDMA : From mobile station to base
station
Baseband OFDMA forward link BS transmitter
Baseband OFDMA forward link receiver
Baseband OFDMA reverse link MS receiver
Subcarrier Assignment in OFDMA

● OFDMA assigns different subcarriers to different

users
● 3 ways of subcarrier assignment
○ Contiguous subcarrier assignment
○ Regular spacing subcarrier assignment
○ Pseudorandom spacing subcarrier assignment