COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS

Prof. Oscar Reyes – Universidad Industrial de Santander

DISCLAIMER
This presentation is meant for educational purposes only. It is based
on the book: “Principles of Electronic Communication Systems”,
3rd Ed. 2007, by Louis E. Frenzel, Jr. McGraw-Hill.
 O. Reyes

LESSON 1

Introduction to Communication Systems

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Summary in Lesson 1
• What is communication?
• History of Telecommunications
• Communication Systems
• Basic concepts
• Modulation Multiplexing and Multiaccess
• Types of Electronic Communication Systems
• A Survey of Communication Applications
• Jobs and Careers in the Communication Industry
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What is communication?

• Process of exchanging information.

• Messages vs. Information vs. Data vs. Metadata

• (Electronic) Communication Systems: accumulation, packaging,

and exchange of information.

• Telecommunication systems.
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History of Telecommunication (I)

Visual, auditory and ancillary methods (non-electrical):

• Prehistoric: Fires, Beacons, Smoke

signals, Communication drums, Horns
• 6th century BCE: Mail
• 5th century BCE: Pigeon post
• 4th century BCE: Hydraulic semaphores
• ca. 490 BCE: Heliographs (shield signals)
• 15th century CE: Maritime flag semaphores
• 1672: First experimental acoustic (mechanical)
telephone
• 1790: Semaphore lines (optical telegraphs)
• 1867: Signal lamps
• 1877: Acoustic phonograph
Source: [Wikipedia]
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History of Telecommunication (II)

Basic electrical signals:

• 1838: Electrical telegraph.

• 1858: First trans-Atlantic telegraph cable
• 1876: Telephone.
• 1880: Telephony via lightbeam photophones

Source: [Wikipedia]
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History of Telecommunication (III)

Advanced electrical and electronic signals:

• 1893: Wireless telegraphy

• 1896: Radio (video)
• 1914: First North American transcontinental telephone calling
• 1927: Television.
• 1930: First experimental videophones
• 1936: World's first public videophone network
• 1946: Limited capacity Mobile Telephone Service for automobiles
• 1956: Transatlantic telephone cable
• 1962: Commercial telecommunications satellite
• 1964: Fiber optical telecommunications
• 1965: First North American public videophone network
• 1969: Computer networking
• 1973: First modern-era mobile (cellular) phone
• 1979: INMARSAT ship-to-shore satellite communications
• 1979: First generation of wireless telephone technology: 1G
• 1981: First mobile (cellular) phone network
• 1982: SMTP email
• 1983: Internet.
• 1991: Second generation of wireless telephone technology: 2G
Source: [Wikipedia]
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History of Telecommunications (IV)

Timeline of Communication tools

Source: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_telecommunication]
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Communication Systems
Interfe-
rence

Transmission
Transmitter Receiver
Channel
(TX) (RX)
Source: Medium
Target: Recovered
Information or intelligence
information and
(audio, video, computer
intelligence
data, etc.)
Noise
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Communication Systems:
Transmitter
The transmitterInterfe-
is a collection of
electronic components
rence and circuits
that converts the electrical signal into
a signal suitable for transmission over
a given medium.
Transmitter Receiver
Channel
(TX) (RX)
Source:
Target: Recovered
Information or intelligence Transmitters are made upandof
information
(audio, video, computer
data, etc.) oscillators, amplifiers, tuned
intelligence

Noisecircuits and filters, modulators,

frequency mixers, frequency
synthesizers, and other
circuits.
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Communication Systems:
Transmission Medium and Channel
Interfe-
A transmission medium is a material
rence
substance (solid, liquid, gas, or plasma)
that can propagate energy waves.

Transmission
Transmitter Receiver
Channel
(TX) (RX)
Source: Medium
Target: Recovered
Information or intelligence
information and
(audio, video, computer
A communication channel
or channel, intelligence
refers either
data, etc.)
to a physical transmission medium such as a wire, or
Noise
to a logical connection over a multiplexed medium
such as a radio channel. A channel is used to convey
an information signal.
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Communication Systems:
Receiver
A receiver is a collection of electronic
Interfe-
components and circuits that accepts the
rence
transmitted message from the channel and
converts it back into a form understandable
by humans.
Transmitter Receiver
Channel
(TX) (RX)
Source:
Target: Recovered
Information or intelligence
information and
(audio, video, computer
data,Receivers contain
amplifiers, oscillators, intelligence
etc.)
mixers, tuned circuitsNoise and filters, and a
demodulator or detector that recovers the
original intelligence signal from the modulated
carrier.
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Communication Systems:
Noise and Interference
Noise is a general term for
Interfe-
unwanted random (and, in general,
rence
unknown) signals that can affect
others during capture, storage,
transmission, processing, or
conversion.
Transmission
Transmitter Receiver
Sometimes the term is also Channel
(TX) (RX)
used to mean signals that
Source: Medium
are random (unpredictable) Target: Recovered
Information or intelligence
and carry no useful information and
(audio, video, computer
information; even if they are intelligence
data, etc.)
not interfering with other
Noise
signals or may have been
introduced intentionally, as
in comfort noise.
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Communication Systems:
Noise and Interference
Interfe-
rence

Transmission
Transmitter Receiver
Channel
(TX) (RX)
Interference is anything
Source: which modifies, or
Medium
Target: Recovered
disrupts a signal as it travels along a channel
Information or intelligence
(audio, video, computer
information and
intelligence
between a source and a receiver. The term
data, etc.)
Noise
typically refers to the addition of unwanted
signals to a useful signal.
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Types of Communication Systems (I)

• Channel
• Wired - Guided
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Types of Communication Systems (I)

• Channel
• Wireless
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Types of Communication Systems (II)

• Bandwidth
• Narrowband
• Broadband and Wideband
(Spread spectrum)
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Types of Communication Systems (III)

• Number of sources/targets
One-to-One (Unicast, Anycast) Many-to-One (Convergecast)

One-to-Many (Broadcast, Multicast) Many-to-Many

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Types of Communication Systems (IV)

• Source of information
Analog: an analog signal is a smoothly and continuously varying voltage or current

Sine wave

Voice

ECG

AM wave
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Types of Communication Systems (IV)

• Source of information
Digital: Digital signals are discrete in domain (time steps) and range (discrete increments).
Most digital signals use binary or two-state codes.

Telegraph (Morse code)

Continuous wave
(CW) code

Serial binary code

(used in computers)
Source: [Frenzel, 2007]
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Types of Communication Systems (V)
• Flow of information
• One-way (simplex) transmissions
Examples:
• AM and FM broadcasting
• Digital radio
• TV broadcasting
• Digital television (DTV)
• Cable television
• Facsimile
• Wireless remote control
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• Paging services
• Navigation and direction-finding services
• Telemetry
• Radio astronomy
• Surveillance
• Music services
• Internet radio and video
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Types of Communication Systems (V)

• Flow of information
• Two-way (full duplex or half duplex) transmissions

Examples:

• Telephones • Family Radio service

• Two-way radio • The Internet
• Radar
• Wide-area networks (WANs)
• Sonar
• Amateur radio • Metropolitan-area networks (MANs)
• Citizens radio • Local area networks (LANs)
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Types of Communication Systems (VI)

• Type of Carrier
• Baseband transmission.
Baseband information can be sent directly and unmodified over the medium or
can be used to modulate a carrier for transmission over the medium.
In telephone or intercom systems, the voice is placed on the wires and
transmitted.
In some computer networks, the digital signals are applied directly to coaxial or
twisted-pair cables for transmission.

• Passband transmission.
A carrier is a high frequency signal that is modulated by audio, video, or data.
A radio-frequency (RF) wave is an electromagnetic signal that is able to travel
long distances through space.
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Basic concepts
• Frequency spectrum
• Power Spectral Density
• Bandwidth:
• Signal bandwidth
• Channel bandwidth
• Analog
• Digital: network bandwidth, data bandwidth
• Discrete / Continuous
• Analog / Digital
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Basic concepts:
Frequency spectrum
∞

ℱ 𝑥 𝑡 =𝑋 𝑓 = 𝑥 𝑡 𝑒 −𝑗2𝜋ft 𝑑𝑡
−∞
∞

ℱ −1 𝑋 𝑓 =𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑋 𝑓 𝑒 𝑗2𝜋ft 𝑑𝑓
−∞
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Basic concepts:
Frequency spectrum
Examples
𝑨 𝑗2𝜋𝒇 𝑡+𝝓
𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑨cos 2𝜋𝒇𝟎 𝑡 + 𝝓 = (𝑒 𝟎 + 𝑒 −(𝑗2𝜋𝒇𝟎 𝑡+𝝓) )
2

𝑨 𝑨
⇒ℱ 𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑋 𝑓 = 𝛿 𝑓 − 𝒇𝟎 𝑒 + 𝛿(𝑓 + 𝒇𝟎 )𝑒 −𝑗𝝓
𝑗𝝓
2 2

|𝑋 𝑓 |
𝑨 𝑨
2 2

𝑓
−𝒇𝟎 0 +𝒇𝟎
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Basic concepts:
Frequency spectrum
Examples
𝑨
𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑨cos 2𝜋𝒇𝟎 𝑡 ⇒ ℱ 𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑋 𝑓 = 𝛿 𝑓 − 𝒇𝟎 + 𝛿(𝑓 + 𝒇𝟎 )
2
𝑨
𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑨sin 2𝜋𝒇𝟎 𝑡 ⇒ ℱ 𝑥 𝑡 = 𝑋 𝑓 = 𝛿 𝑓 − 𝒇𝟎 − 𝛿(𝑓 + 𝒇𝟎 )
2𝒋

|𝑋 𝑓 |
𝑨 𝑨
2 2

𝑓
−𝒇𝟎 0 +𝒇𝟎
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Basic concepts:
Power Spectral Density (PSD)
𝑆𝑋 𝑓 = 𝑋 𝑓 2 [W];
𝑆𝑋 𝑓 = 20 log 𝑋 𝑓 [dB]

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/bd/Bluetooth_signal_behind_wireless_lan_signal.png
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Basic concepts:
Signal Bandwidth
2 𝑋 𝑓 2
𝑋 𝑓

𝑓 𝑓
0 0

2 2
𝑋 𝑓 𝑋 𝑓

𝑓 𝑓
0 0
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Basic concepts:
Signal Bandwidth
2 𝑋 𝑓 2
𝑋 𝑓

𝑓 𝑓
0 𝑓1 0 𝑓1 𝑓2

2 2
𝑋 𝑓 𝑋 𝑓

𝑓 𝑓
0 𝑓1 0 𝑓1 𝑓2
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Basic concepts:
Channel Bandwidth
• Analog bandwidth: frequency response [Hz]
• Attenuation

Source: http://www.fowiki.com/b/understand-fiber-attenuation/
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Basic concepts:
Channel Bandwidth
• Analog bandwidth: frequency response [Hz]
• Attenuation

• Digital bandwidth: (Network bandwidth, Data bandwidth)

• Bandwidth consumption (throughput)
• Bandwidth capacity (channel capacity)
• Bit-rate (bps)
• Symbol-rate (baud)

See examples
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Jobs and Careers in the

Communication Industry
• The electronics industry is roughly divided into four major
specializations:
1. Communications (largest in terms of people employed and the dollar
value of equipment purchased)
2. Computers (second largest).
3. Industrial controls.
4. Instrumentation.
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Jobs and Careers in the

Communication Industry
Types of Jobs
• Engineers design communication equipment and systems.

• Technicians install, troubleshoot, repair, calibrate, and maintain equipment.

• Engineering Technicians assist in equipment design, testing, and assembly.

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Jobs and Careers in the

Communication Industry
Types of Jobs
• Technical sales representatives determine customer needs and related specifications, write
proposals and sell equipment.

• Technical writers generate technical documentation for equipment and systems.

• Trainers develop programs, generate training and presentation materials, and conduct
classroom training.
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Jobs and Careers in the

Communication Industry
Major Employers
• The communication electronics industry is made up of the following
segments:

• Manufacturers
• Resellers
• Service Organizations
• End users

See videos (1), (2), (3)

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Jobs and Careers in the

Communication Industry

Figure 1-18: Structure of the communication electronics industry.

Source: [Frenzel, 2007]
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References
[Frenzel, 2007] Frenzel, Louis E. Principles of Electronic Communication
Systems”, 3rd Ed. McGraw-Hill, 2007.
[Wikipedia] Wikipedia in English, the free Encyclopedia. Visited on Nov. 2013.