DIGITAL

COMMUNICATION

WHAT IS DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION?
Digital communications broadly refers to the
transmission of information using digital
messages or bit streams.
There are notable advantages to transmitting
data using discrete messages.
Errors caused by noise and interference can be
detected and corrected systematically.
Digital communications also make the
networking of heterogeneous systems
possible, with the Internet
being the most obvious such example.

DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION

DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION

Information Source and Input Transducer:

The source of information can be analog or digital, e.g. analog:

audio or video signal, digital: like teletype signal. In digital
communication the signal produced by this source is converted into
digital signal consists of 1s and 0s. For this we need source encoder.
Source Encoder
In digital communication we convert the signal from source
into digital signal as mentioned above. The point to remember is we
should like to use as few binary digits as possible to represent the
signal. In such a way this efficient representation of the source output
results in little or no redundancy. This sequence of binary digits is
called information sequence.
Source Encoding or Data Compression: the process of efficiently
converting the output of whether analog or digital source into a
sequence of binary digits is known as source encoding.

DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION
Channel Encoder:

The information sequence is passed through the channel encoder. The

purpose of the channel encoder is to introduce, in a controlled
manner, some redundancy in the binary information sequence
that can be used at the receiver to overcome the effects of
noise and interference encountered in the transmission on the
signal through the channel.
e.g. take k bits of the information sequence and map that k bits to
unique n bit sequence called code word. The amount of redundancy
introduced is measured by the ratio n/k and the reciprocal of this ratio
(k/n) is known as rate of code or code rate.
Digital Modulator:
The binary sequence is passed to the digital modulator which
in turn converts the sequence into electric signals so that we
can transmit them on channel. The digital modulator maps the
binary sequences into signal wave forms , for example if we represent
1 by sin x and 0 by cos x then we will transmit sin x for 1 and cos x for
0. ( a case similar to BPSK)

DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION
Channel:
The communication channel is the physical medium that is used for
transmitting signals from transmitter to receiver. In a wireless system,
this channel consists of the atmosphere. For traditional telephony, this
channel is wired, there are fiber-optic channels and underwater
acoustic channels.
Digital Demodulator:
The digital demodulator processes the channel corrupted transmitted
waveform and reduces the waveform to the sequence of numbers that
represents estimates of the transmitted data symbols.

DIGITAL
COMMUNICATION

Channel Decoder:
This sequence of numbers then passed through the channel decoder
which attempts to reconstruct the original information sequence from
the knowledge of the code used by the channel encoder and the
redundancy contained in the received data
Source Decoder
At the end, if an analog signal is desired then source decoder tries to
decode the sequence from the knowledge of the encoding algorithm.
And which results in the approximate replica of the input at the
transmitter end
Output Transducer:
Finally we get the desired signal in desired format analog or digital.

INFORMATION CAPACITY
Is a measure of how much information can
be propagated through a communications
system and is a function of bandwidth and
transmission time.
Information capacity represents the
number of independent symbols that can be
carried through a system in a given unit of
time.
The most basic digital symbol used to
represent information is the bit.

Bits and Symbols

BIT, BIT RATE, BAUD,

BANDWIDTH
Bit

BANDWIDTH
Bandwidth

SHANNONS LIMIT & M-ary

ENCODING

DIGITAL MODULATION
TECHNIQUES

Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)

In ASK, Both frequency and phase remain
constant while the amplitude changes. The
amplitude of the carrier assumes one of the two
amplitudes dependent on the logic states of the
input bit stream.

Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)

Frequency Shift Keying (FSK)

Frequency Shift Keying(FSK)

Minimum Shift-Keying FSK
- MSK is binary FSK except that the mark and spaces
frequencies are synchronized with the input bit rate
- The mark and space frequencies are selected such
that they are separated from the center frequency by
an odd exact multiple of one-half of the bit rate
- This ensure that there is a smooth phase transition in
the analog output signal when it changes from mark
to a space frequency or vice versa
Gaussian MSK refers to the shape of the filter that is
used before the modulator to reduce the transmitted
bandwidth of the signal.

FSK

Gaussian Pulse Shaping

Spectral Efficiency in
Practical Radio

Frequency Shift Keying (FSK)

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

- It is a form of angle-modulated,
constant-amplitude digital
modulation
- It is similar to conventional phase
modulation except that with PSK the
input signal is a binary digital signal
and a limited number of output
phases are possible

Binary Phase Shift Keying (BPSK)

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

Quaternary or Quadrature Phase Shift
Keying (QPSK)
- Is another form of angle-modulated,
constant-amplitude digital modulation
- With QPSK four output phases are
possible for a single carrier frequency
- The binary input data for QPSK are
combined into groups of 2 called dibits

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

QPSK

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

Eight-Phase PSK(8-PSK)
- It is an M-ary encoding technique
where M=8
- With an 8-PSK modulator, there are
eight possible output phases
- To encode eight different phases, the
incoming bits are considered in
groups of 3 bits, called tribits

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

Sixteen-Phase PSK(16-PSK)
- It is an M-ary encoding technique
where M=16
- A 16-PSK modulator acts on the
incoming data in groups of 4 bits
called quadbits

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

Differential Binary PSK(DBPSK)

It is alternative form of digital modulation
where the binary input information is
contained in the difference between two
successive signaling elements rather
than the absolute phase
- the difference in the phase of the two
signaling elements determines the logic
condition of the data

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

Spectral Efficiency in
Practical Radio

Quadrature Amplitude Modulation

(QAM)
QAM is a means of
transmitting data by
shifting both the
amplitude and the phase
of the transmitted signal
Tribit output

8-QAM output phase and amplitude vs time relationship

QAM

Quadrature Amplitude
Modulation (QAM)

BANDWIDTH EFFICIENCY
-used to compare the performance of one
digital modulation technique to another.
-ratio of the transmission bit rate to the
minimum bandwidth required for a
particular modulation scheme
transmission bit rate (bps)
B minimum bandwidth (Hz)

Bandwidth efficiency in bits per cycle

CARRIER RECOVERY
The process of extracting a phasecoherent reference carrier from a receiver
signal. Sometimes called phase
referencing
Squaring
Loop BPSK waveform is filtered and then

squared. The squaring circuit removes the modulation

and generates the second harmonics of the carrier
frequency. The harmonic is phase tracked by the PLL.
Costas Loop quadrature loop, uses two parallel
tracking loops (I and Q) to derive the product of the I
and Q components of the signal that drives the VCO.
Remodulator produces a loop error voltage that is
proportional to twice the phase error between the
incoming signal and the VCO signal.

CLOCK RECOVERY
Digital radio requires precise timing or
clock synchronization between the
transmit and the receive circuitry.
It is necessary to regenerate clocks at the receiver
that are synchronous with those at the transmitter.

The recovered data are delayed by

one-half a bit time and then
compared with the original data in an
XOR circuit.

TRELLIS CODE MODULATION

Encoding technique used for data
transmission rates exceeding 56kbps
Developed by Dr. Ungerboeck at IBM
Combines encoding and modulation
to reduce the P(e) thus improving
BER.
Introduction of redundancy in a given
PSK or QAM constellation

PROBABILITY OF ERROR P(e)

and
BIT ERROR RATE (BER)

Probability of Error P(e) mathematical

expectation of the BER for a given system
-- A function of the carrier-to-noise power
ratio : ratio of the average carrier power
(carrier + sidebands) to the thermal noise
power
BER historical record of a systems actual
bit error performance.
A bit error is measured and then compared with
the expected probability of error to evaluate a
systems performance.

ENERGY PER BIT-TO-NOISE

POWER DENSITY RATIO
Used to compare two or more digital
modulation systems that use different
transmission rates (bit rates),modulation
schemes (FSK, PSK, QAM), or encoding
techniques (M-ary)
Simply the ratio of the energy of a single
bit to the noise power present in 1Hz of
bandwidth

The higher the level of encoding used

(higher M), the higher the minimum carrierto-noise power ratio

SUMMARY
Digital transmission uses frequency,
phase, and amplitude variations, just
as does analog transmission.
The maximum data rate of a channel
is a function of bandwidth,
modulation scheme, and signal-tonoise ratio.
More complex modulation schemes
can achieve higher data rates, but
only when the S/N ratio is high.

SUMMARY
FSK uses two (and occasionally more
than two) transmitted frequencies to
achieve modest data rates with good
performances in noisy channels.
GMSK is a special case of FSK that
achieve minimum BW possible for a
2-freq FSK system at given data rate.
Most PSK systems use 4 phase
angles for somewhat higher data
rates than are achievable by FSK.

SUMMARY
QAM achieves higher data rates than
FSK or PSK by using a combination of
amplitude and phase modulation.
QAM requires a relatively noise-free
channel to realize its advantages.
P(e) and BER are used to evaluate a
digital systems performance.
Energy per bit-to-noise power density
ratio is used to compare two or more
digital modulation systems.