DIGITAL COMMUNICATIONS

Autumn 2022
Presenter: PHẠM NGỌC SƠN, PhD

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 Required Course Materials
 Text books
 John G. Proakis, Digital Communications, 4th edition, McGraw-
Hill, 2001. ISBN# 0-07-232111-3
 Bernard Sklar, Digital Communications - Fundamentals and
applications, Prentice Hall,
 U. Madhow, Fundamentals of Digital Communication,
Cambridge University Press, 2008.
 S. G. Wilson, Digital Modulation and Coding, Prentice-Hall,
1996
 References
 Papoulis and Pilla, Probability, Random Variables and Stochastic
Processes, 4th edition, McGraw-Hill, 2002. ISBN# 0-07-
122661-3
 http://www.cse.wustl.edu/~jain/cse574-18/ 2
 What is Digital Communication?

 Digital Communication is any message passed

through digital devices
 Digital Communication can be easy and quick to use
 Digital Communication can be dangerous if you use it
unsafely.
 Some examples of digital communication are: E-
mailing (Computers), Texting (Cell Phones), Online
games…

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 Basic Digital Communication Terms
 Textual Message: information comprised of a sequence
of characters.
 Binary Digit (Bit): the fundamental information unit for
all digital systems.
 Symbol (mi where i=1,2,…M): for transmission of the
bit stream; groups of k bits are combined to form new
symbol from a finite set of M such symbols; M=2k.
 Digital Waveform: voltage or current waveform
representing a digital symbol.
 Data Rate: Symbol transmission is associated with a
symbol duration T. Data rate R=k/T [bps].
 Baud Rate: number of symbols transmitted per second
[baud]. 4
Term Examples (by Figures)

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Term Examples (cont…)

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Block Diagram of Typical Digital Comm. systems

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1. Format

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Sampling Theorem

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 Sampling Theorem
 Sampling Theorem: A band-limited signal having no
spectral components above fm hertz can be determined
uniquely by values sampled at uniform intervals of Ts
seconds, where Ts<=1/(2fm) or sampling rate fs>=2fm.

 In sample-and-hold operation, a switch-and-storage

mechanism forms a sequence of samples of the
continuous input waveform. The output of the
sampling process is called pulse amplitude modulation
(PAM).

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Sampling Theorem

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Spectra for Various Sampling Rates

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Natural Sampling

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 Pulse Code Modulation (PCM)
PCM is the name given to the class of baseband
signals obtained from the quantized PAM
signals by encoding each quantized sample into
a digital word.

The source information is sampled and

quantized to one of L levels; then each
quantized sample is digitally encoded into an ℓ-
bit codeword (ℓ=log2L) .

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Example of Constructing PCM Sequence

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Uniform and Non-uniform Quantization

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 2. Source Encoding
Compression of digital data to eliminate
redundant information.
Source coding is like quantization because its goal
is to reduce bit rate
Source coding is unlike quantization because it
does not introduce distortion.
Huffman Source Coding: based on probability.
Huffman code is a prefix code (A prefix code is
defined as a code in which no code-word is the
prefix of any other code-word.).

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Example of Huffman Coding

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 3. Encryption

Encryption techniques can ensure data privacy

 Very good "public key“ encryption algorithm exist

Bob knows
Alice's public
key and uses it
to encrypt the
message. Alice
uses her private
key to decrypt
the message.

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 4. Channel Coding
Provides protection against transmission errors
by selectively inserting redundant data
Note that quantizer and source encoder work
to decrease redundant information. The
channel encoder inserts redundant
information in a very selective manner.
Two types of Channel Coding: Error
detecting coding and Error Correcting
Coding

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 4. Channel Coding
 Error detecting coding: Capability of detecting
errors so that re-transmission or dropping can
be done.
Cyclic Redundancy Code (CRC).
 Error Correcting Coding: Capability of detecting
and correcting errors.
Block Codes: BCH codes, RS codes, … etc.
Convolutional codes.
Turbo codes.
Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) Code
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 Cyclic Redundancy Code (CRC)
 A short check value is applied to blocks of data entering these systems,
based on the remainder of a polynomial division of their contents.
 The calculation is performed upon retrieval, and if the check values do
not match, corrective action against data corruption can be done.
 The algorithm is based on cyclic codes, and the check (data verification)
value is a redundancy (it increases the message without adding
information)

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Convolutional Coding in WCDMA

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Turbo Coder in WCDMA

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 Hamming Distance
Hamming Distance between two sequences
=Number of bits in which they disagree

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Error Correction Example

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 5. Interleaving
 Bursty Error in Fading Channel

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Interleaving Mechanism

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 Interleaving Mechanism (cont.)
 The WRITE clock places the bit stream x by the row
while the READ clock takes the bit stream y by the
column:

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Burst Error Protection with Interleaver

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 6. Multiplexing
 Multiplexing is a technique which combines multiple
data into one data. Multiplexing is also sometimes
referred to as muxing.

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 7. Modulation
Digital Modulation: digital symbols are
transformed into waveforms that are
compatible with the characteristics of the
channel.
In baseband modulation, these waveforms are
pulses.
In bandpass modulation, the desired
information signal modulates a sinusoid called
a carrier. For radio transmission, the carrier is
converted in an electromagnetic (EM) wave.
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Digital Modulations

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Basic Digital Modulations

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Basic Digital Modulations

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 transmitter
(phase shift keying modulation)
message transmitted +  channel output
signal m(t)  (received signal) x(t)
signal s(t)
0→−1 +
1→+1 channel
for duration T carrier wave
noise w(t)
Accos(2πfc t),
where fc=1/T

received yT decision say 1 if yT > 0

signal x(t)  making
device say 0, otherwise
correlator

local carrier receiver threshold=0

cos(2πfc t)

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Extended Modulated Signals – M-FSK

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Extended Modulated Signals – M-PSK

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Example of BPSK

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 Example of BPSK

Find orthonormal basis? How?

Signal Space Representation (Constellation diagram):

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 Extended Modulated Signals – QAM

 Every 4 bits is represented

by one point in the signal
constellation.
 Every point has its unique
“amplitude” and “phase”.
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Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (QPSK)

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 8. Frequency Spreading
 Frequency Spreading is to provide secure
communications by spreading the signal over a large
frequency band.

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Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS)
 Pseudo-random frequency hopping
 Spreads the power over a wide spectrum Spread
Spectrum
 Developed initially for military
 Avoid the narrowband interferences

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Spectrum of FHSS

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 Direct-Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS)

 Spreading factor = Code bits/data bit, 10-100

commercial (Min 10 by FCC), 10,000 for military
 Signal bandwidth >10 × data bandwidth
 Code sequence synchronization
 Correlation between codes
InterferenceOrthogonal

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Spectrum of DSSS

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 9. Multiple Access
 Many users at same time
 Share a finite amount of radio spectrum
 High performance
 Duplexing generally required
 Frequency domain: Frequency Division Multiple
Access (FDMA).
 Time domain: Time Division Multiple Access
(TDMA).
 Code domain: Code Division Multiple Access
(CDMA).
 Space Division Multiple Access

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Examples of Multiple Access

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 Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM)

• OFDM is a multicarrier transmission technique,

which divides the available spectrum into many
carriers, each one being modulated be a low rate data
stream.
• It has gained popularity because of its capability to
transmit high data rate.
• OFDM is similar to FDMA in that the multiple user
access is achieved by subdividing the available
bandwidth into multiple channels that are then
allocated to users. 

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 OFDM: Orthogonality in frequency domain

• Each carrier is modulated using BPSK / QPSK /

M-ary QAM.
• Each subcarrier is orthogonal to each other.

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 Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access (NOMA)

 All the users are served at the same time,

frequency and code
 Users with better channel conditions get less power
 Successive interference cancellation is used at the
receivers

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 Duplexing

 Note: Duplex = Bi-Directional Communication

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 Channel
Carries signal - could be a telephone wire, free
space
Presents distorted signal to demodulator.
Effects include attenuation, noise, fading.
Fading is very important.
We will usually assume a very simple channel
model most of the time - additive Gaussian
noise

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Channel Capacity

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Shannon's Theorem

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Doppler Shift

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Doppler Spread and Coherence Time

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 Good Communication system?
Large data rate (in bits/sec)
Small bandwidth (in Hertz)
Small signal power (in Watts or dBW)
Low distortion (S/N or bit error rate)
Low cost - with digital communications, large
complexity does not always result in large cost
In practice, there must be tradeoffs made in
achieving these goals

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 Exercises
1. What is wavelength of a signal at 60 GHz?
2. How many Watts of power is 30dBm?
3. A telephone line is known to have a loss of 20 dB. The input
signal power is measured at 1 Watt, and the output signal
noise level is measured at 1 mW. Using this information,
calculate the output signal to noise ratio in dB.
4. What is the maximum data rate that can be supported on a 10
MHz noise-less channel if the channel uses eight-level digital
signals?
5. What signal to noise ratio (in dB) is required to achieve 10
Mbps through a 5 MHz channel?
6. Compute the average Doppler frequency shift at 36 km/hr
using 3 GHz band? Doppler spread is twice the Doppler
shift. What is the channel coherence time?
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