COURSE TITLE: ECE 380 Wireless Communications

CATALOG DESCRIPTION: Overview of existing and emerging wireless
communications systems; interference, blocking, and voice capacity;
radio propagation and fading models; performance of digital
modulation in the presence of fading, OFDM; diversity techniques;
Code-Division Multiple Access, OFDMA.
Prerequisites: EECS 307, 378.

REQUIRED TEXT: T. S. Rappaport, "Wireless Communications",
	       Prentice-Hall, 2002.

REFERENCE TEXTS: A. Goldsmith, "Wireless Communications", 
	         Cambridge University Press, 2005.

		 M. Schwartz, "Mobile Wireless Communications",
	         Cambridge University Press, 2005.

COURSE DIRECTOR: M. Honig

COURSE GOALS: To teach the principles underlying the design of
digital wireless communications and cellular systems,
the effect of radio propagation on digital communications
systems, methods for improving reliability, and multiple access techniques.

PREREQUISITES BY COURSES: 307, 378

PREREQUISITES BY TOPIC:

	ITEM 1: Probability and random variables
	
	ITEM 2: Autocorrelation and power spectral density.

	ITEM 3: Familiarity with digital modulation techniques such as BPSK and QPSK.

DETAILED COURSE TOPICS:

	Week 1. Overview of current and emerging wireless systems,
including cellular, PCS, and third generation systems; cellular models
and frequency reuse.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Chapters 1 and 2)

	Week 2. Narrowband cellular, interference and system capacity,
sectorization, cell splitting, spectral efficiency, trunking and
grade of service.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Ch. 3)

	Week 3. Handoff and outage probability, introduction to radio
propagation: large- and small-scale effects, multipath, path loss,
log-normal shadowing, empirical path loss models.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 4.1, 4.2, 4.9, 4.10 (up to 4.10.5))

	Week 4. Review of complex baseband model, linear time-varying channels,
narrowband signals and Rayleigh fading, Ricean fading, Doppler shift, 
Doppler spread with uniform scattering.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 5.1, 5.2, 5.6, 5.7)

	Week 5. Fade statistics, coherence time, fast vs. slow fading,
broadband signals and power delay profile, coherence bandwidth,
flat vs. frequency-selective fading, effect on digital transmission.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 5.4, 5.5)

	Week 6. Review of digital and quadrature modulation,
error probability with additive Gaussian noise and flat Rayleigh fading,
coherent and noncoherent (differential) detection.
(READINGS: Rappaport, 6.4, 6.5, 6.6, 6.7, 6.8 excluding 6.8.5, 
6.12 excluding 6.12.2-3)

	7. Frequency-Shift Keying, coherent and noncoherent demodulation,
Minimum-Shift Keying, Gaussian MSK, OFDM, power and bandwidth efficiencies.
Overview of diversity techniques.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 6.9, 7.10 excluding 7.10.4, 7.11)

	8. Diversity combining techniques: selection, max-ratio, equal-gain.
Overview of error control coding techniques, interleaving.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 7.12, 7.13, 7.14 excluding 7.14.2, 
7.15-7.18 excluding 7.15.1)

	9. Frequency-, Time-, and Direct-Sequence Code-Division Multiple Access;
applications in standards.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 9.1-9.4, 11.1, 11.2, 11.3 excluding 11.3.7)

	10. Properties of spread spectrum signaling and CDMA, matched-filter
receiver, Signal-to-Interference Plus Noise Ratio and probability of error,
near-far problem, power control, capacity, frequency-hopping, OFDMA.
(READINGS: Rappaport, Secs. 6.11 excluding 6.11.5, 9.7.1, 11.4 up to 11.4.2)


HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS:
Homework 1: Problems on classification and general properties of
wireless systems, computation of signal-to-interference ratio,
capacity, and spectral efficiency with and without sectorization.

Homework 2: Problems on path loss and effect of log-normal shadowing,
computation of delay spread, and computation of fade statistics
and Doppler spectrum.

Homework 3: Problems on computation of error rate for digital modulation
with and without fading, performance of noncoherent detection,
and specification of GMSK waveform.

Homework 4: Problems on the performance of diversity combining techniques.

Homework 5: Problems on the performance of Direct-Sequence
Code-Division Multiple Access.


COMPUTER PROJECTS: Matlab assignments include generation of a scatter
plot of received powers with large-scale path loss and shadowing,
generation of a Rayleigh fading process, and simulation of a simple
digital communications model with Rayleigh fading and diversity.

LABORATORY PROJECTS: none

GRADES:
Four homeworks (including computer assignments): 20%
Midterm: 30%
Final: 50%

COURSE OBJECTIVES:  When a student completes this course, s/he should
be able to:

	1. Classify many of the current and emerging (next generation) wireless
information networks.

	2. Characterize the tradeoffs among frequency reuse,
signal-to-interference ratio, capacity, and spectral efficiency.

	3. Apply exponential path loss models with log-normal shadowing to
determine received power.

        4. Characterize small-scale variations in terms of Doppler spectrum,
coherence time, power delay profile, and coherence bandwidth.

	5. Characterize performance (error probability) for coherent modulation
with and without flat Rayleigh fading, specify FSK, MSK, and GMSK waveforms
and describe associated spectral properties.

	6. Describe and characterize performance of noncoherent (differential)
detection for phase modulation.

	7. Identify commonly used forms of diversity and evaluate the
performance of selection and max-ratio combining in flat Rayleigh fading.

	8. Characterize Time- and Frequency-Division Multiple Access, and
evaluate the associated system capacity and efficiency.

	9. Characterize Direct-Sequence Code-Division Multiple Access,
and compute the associated Signal-to-Interference Plus Noise Ratio and
system capacity for simple channel and receiver models.