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A new propagation model for cellular planning

Conference Paper · October 2006

DOI: 10.1109/ITS.2006.4433237 · Source: IEEE Xplore

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 A New Propagation Model for Cellular Planning
José Nilson C. de Oliveira, Marcelo S. Alencar , Valdemar C. da Rocha Jr. and Waslon T. A. Lopes

Abstract—In cellular planning, it is important to guarantee
the system capacity in order to ensure the minimum power
necessary to provide acceptable levels of the received signal at
the mobile terminals. The transmission effects in adjacent areas
must be estimated, to identify the limiting zones, where the
signal level is minimum and the ones where there is a possibility
of signal interference. Therefore, it is important to choose an
adequate prediction model for the cell planning. This paper
presents the description of a new propagation model for cell
planning.
Index Terms—Cellular mobile system, Propagation model,
Cell planning.
I. INTRODUCTION
Curves of signal power strength need prediction models
and are used in the process of cell planning. However, for
points near the base stations the prediction models usually
lead to power levels higher than the real measurements.
This problem has been detected in the theoretical
propagation model as well as the empirical ones, which are
based on campsite measurements. It is worth to mention that
these models assume the use of omnidirectional antennas.
This approach is useful because it allows drive-test in the
whole coverage area. However, this sort of antenna leads to a
high signal strength near the base stations, because the power
propagates in all directions with the same strength.
This paper presents a new model for the propagation of
signals in a cellular environment. The remaining of this paper
is organized as follows: Section 2 describes the equations for
the new model. The proposed model shows satisfactory
results for signal prediction and also a better adjustment of
the curves of average signal level for regions near the site.
José Nilson C. de Oliveira, Instituto de Tecnologia da Amazônia, Manaus
AM. E-mail: josen@telemar-am.com.br.
Marcelo S. de Alencar, Institute of Advanced Studies in Communications.
Department of Electrical Engineering, Federal University of Campina
Grande, Brazil.. E-mail: malencar@dee.ufcg.edu.br.
Valdemar C. da Rocha Jr, Department of Electronics and Systems, Federal
University of Pernambuco, Brazil. E-mail: vcr@ufpe.br.
Waslon Terllizzie Araújo Lopes, Department of Electrical Engineering,
College ÁREA1. E-mail: waslon@area1.br.
II. EQUATIONS FOR THE NEW MODEL
By using campsite measurements and heuristic methods, the
new model equation can satisfy some criteria:
1) A slowly increasing for small distances and rapidily
decreasing for long distances;
2) Low complexity to permit a low cost computational
imprementation;
3) Product form in order to fit the decibel format.
The first criterion is established by observing the curves in
Fig. 1, which gives the campsite measurements obtained from
a three-sector cell in a mobile system.
The second criterion is based on the necessity of
implementation of the model in prediction coverage software.
The software determine de power of a highest number of
points of the area which is intended to be a mobile service
coverage area.
The last criterion comes from the fact the decibel is largely
used in the propagation scenario. Thus, the equation which
describes the product-behavior of the new model will be
converted in additions.
The following equation satisfies the previous criteria
y = x.10 − kx , (1)
where
y is the dependent variable;
x is the independent variable;
k is a constant.
It can be seen from Equation 1 that the variable y linearly
increases for small values of x because the variable x is
dominant in this case. On the other hand, as higher is the
variable x, smaller is the value of y because that factor 10-kx
is dominant in this second framework.
By using the general form of Equation 1, a new propagation
model is suggested as
d
d −m.
Pr = p 0 . .10 d 0 (2)
d0

The previous expression can be converted to dBm units.

Tehrefore, the average power can be given by

d d
Pr = P0 + 10 . log( ) − 10 .m.
d0 d0

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 [dBm] (3) It is well-known that a given function achieves its
maximum, minimum, extreme points when its derivative is
zero. For this particular case, there is only minimum because
Finally, the propagation loss (or path loss) can be the q function takes only positive value (squared error).
determined by simply inverting the signals in Equation 3. The sample values (Xi, Yi) are constant. Thus, by deriving
Thus, the following equation is obtained function q in relation to po and m, and considering that the
result equals zero, it is easy to obtain ( p̂ o , m̂ ) by using
⎛d ⎞ ⎛ d ⎞. (4) Equations 8 and 9. The coefficients ( p̂ o , m̂ ) are Least Mean
Yc = po − 10 log⎜⎜ ⎟⎟ + 10m⎜⎜ ⎟⎟
⎝ do ⎠ ⎝ do ⎠ Square for the square real values and unknown for po and m.

The overbars in Equation 4 denote the set of all possible ∂q k

values for the path loss for a given d, which is the distance = −2∑ (Yi − po + 10 log ( X i ) − 10mX i ) = 0. (8)
∂po i =1
between the transmitter and the receiver. The exponent m is a
exponent that corresponds to the path loss. The parameter d0
∂q
= 2⎡⎢∑ (Yi − po + 10 log ( X i ) − 10mX i )⎤⎥ (− 10 X i ) = 0 .
k
represents the initial distance near the site and po is an (9)
increment for the initial loss calculated from campsite ∂m ⎣ i =1 ⎦
measurements at distance d0.

Now, the Least Mean Square (LMS) [1] Algorithm is used to ⎧ k (Y − p + 10 log ( X ) − 10mX ) = 0.
obtain the parameters m and po. ⎪∑i =1
i o i i

⎪ (10)
⎨
⎪k
A. Application of the Least Mean Square Algorithm (LMS)
to Determine Parameters m and po
(
⎪∑ Yi X i − p o X i + 10 X i log ( X i ) − 10mX i = 0.
⎩ i =1
2
)
The LMS Algorithm is a process that searches for coefficients
that minimizes the summation of the squared error, i.e., min For the case where the derivative are zero, the minimum of
function q is find out by means of some algebraic operations,
ε 2
∑( i ). k
By considering a Gaussian distribution for the errors, the such as ∑ po = kpo , where the values of ( p̂ o , m̂ ) are
i =1
most probable estimates can be find by LMS. In this case, the
estimates for the equation coefficients are linear, unbiased obtained considering Gaussian function represented by,
and have minimum variance.
The proposed model involves a logarithm regression
expressed by Equation 5. In this expression Xi is an ⎧ k Y − kp + 10 k log ( X ) − 10m k X = 0.
⎪∑ i o ∑ i ∑ i
independent variable, Yi is the dependent variable and εi is a
i =1 i =1 i =1
⎪ (11)
random term with Gaussian distribution with zero mean and ⎨
⎪k k k k
variance σ2. ⎪∑ Yi X i − p o ∑ X i + 10∑ X i log ( X i ) − 10m∑ X i = 0.
2

⎩ i =1 i = 1 i = 1 i = 1

Yi = po − 10 log( X i ) + 10mX i + ε i . (5)

⎧ ⎛ k X ⎞m = − k Y − 10 k log ( X ).
In the regression model presented in Equation 5, the change ⎪− kp o − 10⎜⎝ ∑ i ⎟
⎠
∑ i ∑ i
i =1 i =1 i =1 (12)
of coefficients po and m leads to new values for the errors, as ⎪⎪
can be seen in Equation 6. The squared errors are determined ⎨
⎪ k
⎪⎛⎜ − ∑ X i ⎞⎟ p o − ⎛⎜10∑ X i 2 ⎞⎟m = −∑ Yi X i − 10∑ X i log ( X i ) = 0.
k k k
as a function of the coefficients presented in Equation 7
where q is a function which represents the summation of the ⎩⎪⎝ i =1 ⎠ ⎝ i =1 ⎠ i =1 i =1

squared errors. Thus,

ε i = Yi − p 0 + 10 log ( X i ) − 10 mX i . (6)
Solving the previous linear system, one can achieve
k k expression for p̂ o and m̂ as follows,
q = ∑ (ε i ) = ∑ (Yi − po + 10 log ( X i ) − 10 mX i ) ,
2 2
(7)
i =1 i =1

i = 1,2,..., k . ⎡⎛ k k
⎞⎛ k
2 ⎞ ⎛ k ⎞⎛ k k
⎞⎤
⎢⎜⎜ − ∑ Yi − 10∑ log( X i )⎟⎟⎜⎜ − 10∑ X i ⎟⎟ + 10⎜⎜ ∑ X i ⎟⎟⎜⎜ − ∑ X i Yi − 10∑ X i log( X i )⎟⎟⎥
) ⎣⎝ i = 1 i =1 ⎠⎝ i =1 ⎠ ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎝ i = 1 i =1 ⎠⎦
po = 2
Therefore, for given set of data, uncountable po and m
k
⎛ k ⎞
10k ∑ X i − 10⎜⎜ ∑ X i ⎟⎟
2

⎝ i =1 ⎠
permit to adjust the equations. However, there is a special i =1

pair, for which the main task is to find out coefficients that (13)
achieve a minimum value for the squared error.
In order to tell this special pair from the entire set, this pair
will be referred to as ( p̂ o , m̂ ) .

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 − k ⎛⎜ − ∑ X i Yi − 10∑ X i log ( X i )⎞⎟ + ⎛⎜ ∑ X i ⎞⎟⎛⎜ − ∑ Yi − 10∑ log ( X i )⎞⎟
k k k k k

)
m= ⎝ i =1 i =1 ⎠ ⎝ i =1 ⎠⎝ i =1 i =1 ⎠.
2
k
⎛
10k ∑ X i − 10⎜ ∑ X i ⎟
2
k
⎞
i =1 ⎝ i =1 ⎠

(14)

B. Performance of the New Model

In order to evaluate the performance of the proposed model
some measurements were taken of the signal strength in a
three-sector site, located in a urban area of Manaus, State of
Amazonas, Brazil. From the collected data, it was possible to
determine the statistical parameters and the corresponding
standard deviation, σ , between the measured data and the
losses predicted by the new model.
The morphological data of the measured coverage area was
used in the implementation of the prediction model Cost 231
Walfisch-Ikegami and Hata-Cost 231 [3,4,5]. The results of
this implementation were compared in terms of the standard
deviation of the new model. The results are presented in
Table I.

TABLE I
STANDARD DEVIATION OF THE PREDITION MODELS
Cost 231
Hata-Cost
Sector Walfisch-Ikegami
231 [dB]
[dB]
1 9.98 9.89
2 10.93 10.61
3 11.77 11.60
It can be seen from Table I that the new model presented,
for all sectors, standard deviations close to the predition
models Cost 231 Walfisch-Ikegami and Hata-Cost 231. It is
worth to mention that this model was implemented taking
into account a certain European city where a standard
deviation in the range 7-10 dB was obtained.
It is important to mention that the standard deviation for the
three models presented in Table I are close to the results
found in the literature [2] considering urban areas
Figure 1 shows curves describing the signal power strength
for the proposed model as well as the Lee Model (reference)
used to represent the measurements, Cost 231 Walfish-
Ikegami and Hata-Cost [3,4,5,6] implemented from the
morphological data of the coverage areas used in this work.
It can be seen from Figure 1 that the signal power strength
curves obtained from Lee (reference), Cost 231 Walfisch-
Ikegami and Hata-Cost 231 Models, that the predicted values
are higher than the measurement data (dots) for places located
near the site. On the other hand, the behavior of the signal
power strength of the new model shown for points far the site
are in agreement.
New Model
[dB]
9.80
9.78
12.05 Fig. 1. Comparison between the new model and the
models and the measured data in terms of the power signal
strength as a function of the distance.
III. CONCLUSION
This paper presents a new model to determine the
propagation loss for the transmitted signal in a cellular
system. From measurements in an urban environment, the
new model presented good performance, specially for points
with distance of 500 m or less from the base station.
REFERENCES
[1] Ruggiero, M. A. G. e Lopes, V. L. R., “ Cálculo Numérico – Aspectos
Teóricos e Computacionais “ McGraw Hill, 1988.
[2] Rappaport. T. S., et. al., “Wireless Communications Principles &
Practice”, Prentice-Hall, 1996.
[3] EURO-COST 231, “Urban Transmission Loss Models for Small-Cell
Mobile Radio in the 900 and 1800 MHz Bands,” Propagation Models
Report No. COST231 TD(90) 119, revision 1, Sep. 1991.
[4] D. Parsons, “The Mobile Radio Propagation Channel”, 2nd ed. John
Wiley & Sons, Ltd. England, 2000.
[5] Cádetra, Manuel F. and Jesús Pérez-Arriaga, “Cell Planning for
Wireless Communications”, Artech House mobile communications
library,1999.

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