Spread Spectrum Techniques and Their Applications To Wireless Communications
Spread Spectrum Techniques and Their Applications To Wireless Communications
TO WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS
Abstract: Spread Spectrum (SS) radio place. WLAN systems based on SS have exhibited
communications is on the verge of potentially enormous growth in popularity the benefits of SS
explosive commercial development. A SS multiple signaling are well known and have been extensively
accesses, such as CDMA, have been chosen for 3G described in literature.
wireless communications. Other current applications
It can provide Protection against jamming .It can
of SS techniques are in Wireless LAN and Satellite
operate with a low power spectral density and facilitate
Navigation Systems. However, SS techniques will
coexistence with other systems it is difficult to detect for
play important role also in future wireless
unauthorized receivers [Moreover, SS provides effective
applications, mainly combined with other
means for communicating reliably over channels that
technologies such as OFDM, MIMO and UWB. In
exhibit multipath propagation .
this paper, after an overview on SS signaling and its
While SS techniques have a predominant position in
advantages, some of the most important techniques
current wireless applications and future wireless
based on SS signaling for current and future wireless
communications. Other technologies have been
applications are described. Particular relevance is
considered for future communication systems, such as:
given to DS- CDMA and hybrid CDMA-based
(1 Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
multiple access schemes, such as TDMA-
(OFDM) based systems, or more in general multicarrier
OFDM,OFDM-CDMA.
systems.(2) MIMO systems, which aim at employing
the spatial diversity of the wireless channel.
1. INTRODUCTION
However, SS/CDMA has still unique features that future
SPREAD Spectrum (SS) radio communications, born systems must take advantage of When multiple
as a military technology, is now widely exploited for access to a common communication means is
commercial and industrial purposes. Applications for considered, characteristics such as soft-capacity, the
commercial SS techniques range from cellular proper use of the power control and flexibility features
communications, Wireless LAN (Local Area Network), that represent requirements for future wireless systems
Satellite Navigation Systems [To Developments in 3G .As a mater of fact, combination of CDMA with OFDM,
systems based on SS/Code Division Multiple Access in different variants is one of the main candidate for 4G
(SS/CDMA) have reached a level of maturity where systems.
commercial products and operational networks are in
The overview on SS techniques that is presented in this performance impact to or from the other systems. This
paper aims at outlining the main characteristics that feature make unlicensed SS operation attractive to
makes SS signalling attractive for future developments manufactures.
in wireless communications. Moreover, the main current
(3) SS wideband signals can be used to construct very
and future applications of SS techniques in wireless
precise ranging and radar systems . This aspect have
communications are presented.
been commonly used in the aerospace field for many
years.
A SS signal is a signal obtained by direct method of the In Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) protocols
data by a relatively wideband signal that is uncorrelated the entire transmission bandwidth is shared between all
with the information signal and it is derived from a users at all time and the multiple access property is
digital sequence. This process of ‘‘spreading the achieved by assigning each user a different code. This
transmission power over a wider spectrum, makes the code is used in the spreading process. The receiver
signal not distinguishable from back ground noise receives multiple wide band signals and uses the code
during the transmission. Therefore, a not intended assigned to the user to transform the received wideband
observer would overlook it. Only the intended receiver signal back to the original signal. During this process,
is able to detect the signal by knowing the sequence the desired signal power is compressed into the original
used for the spreading process. The background noise signal bandwidth while the wideband signals of the
could include other wideband signals with more or less users remain wideband signals and appear as noise
the same power level. In this way, the SS principle can when compared to the desired signal. As long as the
be used for multiple access to the channel. Different number of interfering users is not too large, the signal-
users can transmit simultaneously, in the same band, by to-noise ratio will be large enough to extract the desired
using different spreading sequences, with low cross- signal without error. Thus in this case the multiple
correlation properties. An important characteristic of access protocol behaves as a contentionless protocol.
this multiple access technique is that users can start their However, if the number of users rises above a certain
transmissions at any arbitrary time, No synchronization limit, the interference becomes-too large for the desired
in the transmissions is needed. Furthermore, by signal to be extracted and contention occurs, thus
transmitting a wideband signal and by using a RAKE making the protocol interference limited
receiver it is also possible to get frequency diversity
3.1 Direct Sequence CDMA
gain over a frequency selective channel. Other
properties coming from the wideband noise-like In DS-CDMA, each user’s information symbol is spread
structure of the signal are: over the wideband channel by its unique signature
sequence (c1,c2,…. .. cN) characterized by a chip
(I) A narrow band signal, intentionally transmitted to
waveform
disturb the communication, will be spread at the
receiver by the depreading process, thus making his
contribution negligible in the band of information signal
(anti-jamming).
Denoting bi(j) w{±l) with the binary data stream that the
user i intends to transmit (or, the base station intends so
transmit towards the user i), the transmitted signal by
the user (Or towards the user is written as above)
6. CONCLUSIONS