Week 7 - SIGNALS AND TRANSMISSION

The Communication System

Basic Components of A Communication System

A typical communication system consists of 5 basic components as shown below:

Figure 3.1: Components of a communication system

Source: Source is where the data is originated. Typically it is a computer, but it can be
any other electronic equipment such as video, telephone handset, camera, etc, which can
generate data for transmission to some destinations.

Transmitter: As itswell known that data cannot be sent in its native or raw form, so it is
necessary to convert it into a signal. This is performed with the help of a transmitter such
as a modem.

Communication Medium: The signal can be sent to the receiving ends through a
communication medium, which could be a coaxial cable, a simple twisted-pair of wire
optical fiber, or a wireless communication system.

Receiver: The receiver receives the signal and converts it back to the data before sending
it to the destination. The data that the destination receives may not be identical to that of
the originally sent data, because of the corruption or loss of data in the transmission
process.

Destination: Destination is where the data is absorbed. Again, it can be a computer

system, a television set, a telephone handset, and so on.
Data
Data refers to information that conveys some meaning based on some mutually agreed up rules
or conventions between a sender and a receiver and today it varies in forms such as text, video,
audio, graphics, and animation.
Data can be of two types; analog and digital. Analog data take on continuous values on some
interval. Typical examples of analog data are voice and video. The data that is achieved from the
real world with the help of transducers are continuous-valued or analog. On the other hand,
digital data take on discrete or non-continuous values. Text or character strings can be
considered as examples of digital data. Characters are represented by suitable codes, e.g. ASCII
code, where each character is represented by a 7-bit code.

Signal
It is the electrical, electronic, or optical representation of data, which can be sent through a
communication medium. Stated in mathematical terms, a signal is merely a function of the data.
For example, a microphone converts voice data into a voice signal, which can be sent over a pair
of wire. Analog signals are continuous-valued; digital signals are discrete-valued. The
independent variable of the signal could be time (speech, for example), space (images), or the
integers (denoting the sequencing of letters and numbers in the football score).

Basic signal types

Telecommunications media carry two basic types of signals, analog and digital. In addition to
being represented by an analog signal, data can also be represented by a digital signal. Most
digital signals are aperiodic and thus, frequency or period is not appropriate. Two new terms, bit
rate(instead of frequency) and bit interval(instead of period) are used to describe digital signals.
The bit rate is the number of bit intervals per second. This means that the bit rate is the number
of bits sent in one second, usually expressed in bits per second (bps). while The bit interval is the
time required to send one single bit.

Analog signals are continuous waves that transmit information by changing the forms of
the waves. Analog signals have two parameters, amplitude, and frequency. For example,
voice and all sound are analog, traveling to human ears in the form of waves. The higher
the waves (or amplitude), the louder the sound; the more closely packed the waves, the
higher the frequency or pitch. Radio, telephones, and recording equipment historically
transmit and receive analog signals, but they are beginning to change to digital signals.
 Figure 3.2: Analog signal

Digital signals do not have the form of wave or shape that is found in analog. Rather, they
are discrete pulses that are either 0 or 1, on or off or true or false. This quality allows them to
convey information in a binary form that can be interpreted by computers. Computers
typically cannot distinguish whether an analog wave is in an “on” mode or an “off” mode.

Figure 3.3: Digital signal

Signal Characteristics
A signal can be represented as a function of time, i.e. it differs with time. However, it can be also
expressed as a function of frequency, i.e. a signal can be considered as a composition of different
frequency components. Thus, a signal has both the frequency domain and time-domain
representation.

Time-domain concepts
A periodic signal is characterized by the following three parameters.

Amplitude: It is the value of the signal at different instants of time. It is measured in volts.
Frequency: It is inverse of the period (T), i.e. f = 1/T. The unit of frequency is cycles per second
or Hertz (Hz).
Phase: It gives a measure of the relative position in time of two signals within a single period. It
is represented by φ in degrees or radian.
A sine wave, the most fundamental periodic signal, can be completely characterized by its
amplitude, frequency, and phase.

Baseband and Broadband Signals

Depending on some type of typical signal formats or modulation schemes, a few terminologies
developed to classify different types of signals. So, we can have either baseband or broadband
signaling.

Base-band is defined as one that uses digital signaling, which is inserted in the transmission
channel as voltage pulses.

On the other hand, broadband systems are those, which use analog signaling to transmit
information using a carrier of high frequency.
In baseband LANs, the entire frequency spectrum of the medium is being used for transmission
and hence the FDM frequency division multiplexing cannot be used. Signals inserted at a point
propagates in both the directions, hence transmission is bi-directional. Baseband systems extend
only to limited distances because at a higher frequency, the attenuation of the signal is most
pronounced and the pulses blur out, causing the large distance communication impractical.
Since broadband systems use analog signaling, frequency division multiplexing is possible,
where the frequency spectrum of the cable is divided into several sections of bandwidth. These
separate channels can support different types of signals of various frequency ranges to travel in
the same instance. Unlike base-band, broadband is a unidirectional medium where the signal
inserted into the media propagates in only one direction. Two data paths are required, which are
connected at a point in the network called headend. All the stations transmit towards the headend
on one path and the signals received at the headend are propagated through the second path

TRANSMISSION IMPAIRMENTS

Signals travel through a defective transmission media. The defection causes signal impairment
(degradation in quality). If the transmission media were infallible, the receiver could receive the
same signal that the transmitter sent. But communication lines are usually not perfect, so the
received signal is not the same as the transmitted signal. This means that the signal at the
beginning of the medium is not the same as the signal at the end of the medium i.e. what is sent
is not what is received. For analog signals, these impairments cause degradation of signal
quality. For digital signals, bit errors are introduced: 0 bit is been altered to 1 bit or otherwise.

Causes of Transmission Impairments

The major causes of impairments are:

Attenuation

Delay Distortion
Noise

Attenuation

The amplitude of a signal reduces as the signal travels through the transmission medium
(signal strength falls off with distance). This is known as Attenuation. When a signal,
simple or composite, travels over a medium, it loses some of its energy in overcoming the
resistance of the medium. That is why a wire carrying electric signals gets warm, if not
hot, after a while. Some of the electrical energy in the signal is converted to heat. To
compensate for this loss, amplifiers or repeaters are inserted at intervals along the
medium to improve the received signal level as close as to its original level (i.e. to
overcome the loss).Figure 3.1 below shows the effect of attenuation and amplification.

Figure 3.1: Illustration of attenuation

Measurement of Attenuation

To show that a signal has lost or gained strength, the unit of “decibel” is used. Decibel (dB)
measures the relative strengths of two signals or one signal at two different points. The decibel
gives a positive value when the signal is amplified but negative if attenuated.

The formular for computing decibel (dB) is :

dB= 10log P2/P1

Where P1 and P2 are the powers of a signal at points 1 and 2, respectively.

Example 1: If a signal moves through a transmission medium and has its power reduced by half.
Compute the attenuation.

Solution

Since the power was reduced by half, it implies P2 is (1/2)P1.

Thus, we compute the attenuation (loss of power) as follows:

10log P2/P1 = 10log0.5P1/P1 = 10log 0.5 = 10 (-0.3) = -3dB

Interpretation: This implies that a loss of 3 dB (-3 dB) is equal to losing one-half the power.

Example 2: A signal has its power increased by 100 times while traveling through an amplifier,
Calculate the gain in power.

Solution

This means that P2 = 100P1.

In this case, the amplification (gain of power) can be calculated as

Since P2 = 100P1

Then, 10log P2/P1 = 10log 100P1/P1 = 10log 100 = 10x2 = 20 dB

Note: One of the reasons that decibel is used to measure signal strength is that dB numbers can
be added or subtracted when we are measuring several points instead of just two.

Example 3

Figure 3.2 shows a signal that travels from point 1 to point 4. Calculate the value of dB.

Figure 3.2: Movement of a signal between 4 points

Solution

In this case, the decibel value can be calculated by summing up all values of attenuation and
amplification.

Thus,

dB = -3+7-3 = 1dB

Delay Distortion

Delay distortion is a phenomenon peculiar to guided transmission media such as copper

wire, coaxial cable, twisted pairs, etc. The distortion is caused by the fact that the velocity
of propagation of a signal through a medium varies with frequency. A signal consisting
of several frequencies will have its components arrive at the receiver at different times;
 therefore different components arrive with different delays at the receiver. This simply
shows that the signals have different phases at the receiver than they did at the source. In
digital data transmission, some signal components of the one-bit position will spill over
into other bit positions, causing inter-symbol interference, which limits maximum bit rate
transmission.

Noise

This refers to unwanted signals that are inserted into the real signal during transmission,
in other words, it is the additional undesired signals inserted between transmitter and
receiver. Noise can be divided into four different categories, namely: Thermal noise,
Inter-modulation noise, Crosstalk, and Impulse noise.

Thermal Noise

Thermal noise is the random motion of electrons in a wire which generates an extra signal not
originally sent by the transmitter. This is uniformly distributed across the frequency spectrum
and hence, it is present in all electronic devices and transmission media. It is a function of
temperature. This noise cannot be completely destroyed and it is also referred to as white noise.

Inter-modulation Noise

This noise appears when two signals of different frequencies share the same communication
medium, due to the nonlinearity of the transmitters, this produces signals that are sum,
difference, or multiples of original frequencies (f1+f2, f1-f2, f1f2). They are undesired
components and need to be filtered out.

Crosstalk

Crosstalk is the effect a wire has on the other, it occurs when a signal from one wire is picked up
by another. It is the unwanted coupling between signal paths. This coupling is common in
telephone networks and as a result, we hear other people’s conversations in the background.

Impulse Noise

This is a non-continuous noise, consisting of irregular pulses or noise spikes (a signal with high
amplitude and short duration) that come from power lines, lightning, communication system
faults, and so on. The figure below illustrates the effect of noise on a signal.
 Figure 3.3: Effect of noise on the signal

Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR)

SNR is a parameter used to determine the value of how much noise is present in a signal. It is the
ratio of what is required (signal power) to what is not required (noise power). A high SNR means
the signal is less corrupted by noise while a low SNR means the signal is more corrupted by
noise. Typically measured at the receiver to process the signal and eliminate undesired noise, it is
usually given in dB and referred to as SNRdB. It is expressed as:

SignalPowe r NoisePower
SNR =

Signalpowe r
(SNR)dB = 10log Noisepower

Example 4: If the power of a signal is 10 mW and the power of the noise is 1μW; Calculate the
SNR and SNRdB?

Solution

The values of SNR and SNRdB can be calculated as follows:

SNR = signal power/ noise power = 10mW/1μW = 10,000

(SNR)dB = 10 log 10,000 = 40

Example 5: Calculate the values of SNR and SNRdB for a noiseless channel

Solution

For a noiseless channel, the noise power is zero.

SNR = signal power/ noise power = signal power/0 = ∞

(SNR)dB = 10log ∞ = ∞

In an ideal situation, we can never achieve a noiseless channel.