ENABLING

THE FUTURE OF COMMUNICATION

A QUALCOMM CDMA
is dedicated to

THE PROMISE OF 3G
BY
DECCAN COLLEGE OF ENGG & TECH.

NABILAH IBRAHIM
ECE III YEAR
Nabilah_20@yahoo.com.
9030830306
 Simulation of Third Generation CDMA Systems
ABSTRACT

The goal for the next generation simulator was implemented

of mobile communications according to the physical layer

system is to seamlessly specification of the IMT-2000

integrate a wide variety of WCDMA system. The data is

communication services such as transmitted in a frame-by-frame

high-speed data, video and basis through a time varying

multimedia traffic as well as channel. The transmitted signal

voice signals. The technology is corrupted by multiple access

needed to tackle the challenges interference which is generated

to make these services available in a structured way rather than

is popularly known as the third treating it as Additive White

Generation (3G) Cellular Gaussian Noise (AWGN). The

Systems. One of the most signal is further corrupted by

promising approaches to 3G is AWGN at the front end of the

to combine a Wideband Code receiver. Simple rake diversity

Division Multiple Access combining is employed at the

(WCDMA) air interface with the receiver. We investigate the bit

fixed network of Global system error rate at both uplink and

for Mobile communications downlink for different channel

(GSM). In this thesis a signal conditions. Performance

improvement due to error investigating the design and

correction coding scheme is implementation of WCDMA

shown. The simulator developed systems.

can be an invaluable tool for

Third Generation Cellular next generation cellular systems

Systems are [1]:

Third generation cellular • Voice quality

systems are being designed to comparable to Public

support wideband services like Switched Telephone

high speed Internet access, Network (PSTN)

video and high quality image • Support of high data

transmission with the same rate. The following

quality as the fixed networks. table shows the data

The primary requirement of the rate requirement of the

3G systems

3G Data Rate Requirements

Mobility Needs Minimum Data Rate
Vehicular 144 kbps
Outdoor to indoor and pedestrian 384 kbps
Indoor Office 2 Mbps
• Support of both packet- • Support of a wide
switched and circuit- variety of mobile
switched data services. equipment
• More efficient usage of • Backward Compatibility
the available radio with pre-existing
spectrum networks and flexible
 introduction of new Research efforts
services and have been underway for
technology more than a decade to
• An adaptive radio introduce multimedia
interface suited to the capabilities into mobile
highly asymmetric communications. Different
nature of most Internet standard agencies and
communications: a governing bodies are
much greater band trying to integrate a wide
width for the downlink variety of proposals for
than the uplink. third generation cellular
systems.

The following figure, adopted [1], shows the evolution of

third generation cellular systems:
TDD

PDC ARIB(WCDMA)

Multicarrier
GPRS WCDMA
Multicode

GSM UTRA(WCDMA)
FDD

EDGE
 136 HS

AMPS IS-54 ANSI-136 UWC136

136+

cdmaOne cdma2000

IS-95B

Figure : Evolution of 3G

WCDMS: Air Interface Telecommunication

for 3G Union (ITU) and its

• One of the most International Mobile

promising approaches Telecommunications

to 3G is to combine a for the year 2000 (IMT

Wideband CDMA 2000) initiative for 3G.)

(WCDMA) air interface The information is spread

with the fixed network over a band of approximately 5

of GSM. Several MHz. This wide bandwidth has

proposals supporting given rise to the name

WCDMA were Wideband CDMA or WCDMA.

submitted to the There are two different modes

International namely
 • Frequency Division using synchronized time
Duplex (FDD) intervals. Thus time slots in a
• Time Division Duplex
physical channel are divided
(TDD)
Since different regions have into transmission and reception

different frequency allocation part.

schemes, the capability to WCDMA Key Features

operate in either FDD or TDD Support of high data rate

mode allows for efficient transmission: 384 kbps with

utilization of the available wide area coverage, 2 Mbps

spectrum. A brief definition of with local coverage.

FDD and TDD modes is given • High service flexibility :

next. support of multiple

FDD: The uplink and downlink parallel variable rate

transmission employ two services on each

separated frequency bands for connection.

this duplex method. A pair of • Both Frequency

Division Duplex (FDD)
frequency bands with specified
and Time Division
separation is assigned for a
Duplex (TDD).
connection. • Built in support for

TDD: In this duplex method, future capacity and

coverage enhancing
uplink and downlink
technologies like
transmissions are carried over adaptive antennas,

the same frequency band by advanced receiver

 structures and and hand over to other
transmitter diversity. systems, including
• Support of inter hand over to GSM.
frequency hand over • Efficient packet access.
WCDMA Key Technical Characteristics

The following table shows the key technical features of the

WCDMA radio interface :

WCDMA Key Technical Characteristics

Multiple Access Scheme DS-CDMA

Duplex Scheme FDD/TDD
Packet Access Dual mode (Combined and
dedicated channel)
Multirate /Variable rate scheme Variable spreading factor and
Multi-code
Chip Rate 3.84 Mcps
Carrier Spacing 4.4-5.2 MHz (200 KHz carrier
rater)
Frame Length 10 ms
Inter Base Station synchronization FDD: No Accurate synchronization
needed TDD : Synchronization
required
Channel Coding Scheme Convolution Code (rate1/2 and
1/3) Turbo Code

The chip rate may be higher than 2 Mbps. The 200

extended to two or three times KHz carrier raster has been

the standard 3.84 Mcps to chosen to facilitate co-existence

accommodate for data rates and interoperability with GSM.

WCDMA Physical This provides a layer 1 (also

termed as Physical Layer)

Layer
description of the radio access

network of WCDMA system

operating in the FDD ;mode. The • Dedicated Physical

spreading and modulation Control Channel

operation for the Dedicated (DPCCH): to carry layer

Physical Channels (DPCH) at 1 control information.

both the links is illustrated in Each connection is

detail since it is the most allocated one DPCCH and

essential part of the simulator zero, one or several

that we implemented. The DPDCHs. In addition, there

uplink and downlink data are common physical

structure for the DPCHs is channels defined as :

described. The spreading and • Primary and secondary

scrambling codes used in both Common Control

the links are investigated Physical Channels

Physical Channel Structure (CCPCH) to carry

WCDMA defines two downlink common

dedicated physical channels in channels

both links: • Synchronization

• Dedicated Physical Channels (SCH) for cell

Data Channel (DPDCH): search

to carry dedicated data • Physical Random

generated at layer 2 Access Channel

and above. (PRACH)

 The spreading and modulation and before

modulation for the DPDCH pulse shaping. The

and the DPCCH for both spreading modulation

the links are described in used in the uplink is dual

the following two channel QPSK. Spreading

subsections. modulation consists of two

Uplink Spreading and different operations. The

Modulation first one is spreading

In the uplink the where each data symbol is

data modulation of both spread to a number of

the DPDCH and the chips given by the

DPCCH is Binary Phase spreading factor. This

Shift Keying (BPSK). The increases the bandwidth

modulated DPCCH is of the signal. The second

mapped to the Q-channel, operation is scrambling

while the first DPDCH is where a complex valued

mapped to the I-channel. scrambling code is applied

Subsequently added to spread signal. Figure

DPDCHs are mapped 2.1 shows the spreading

alternatively to the I- and modulation for an

channel or the Q-channel. uplink user. The uplink

Spreading Modulation is user has a DPDCH and a

applied after data DPCCH.

 The bipolar data detection and error

symbols on I and Q correction. Channel coding

branches are scheme at the WCDMA

independently multiplied system is a combination of

by different canalization error detection, error

codes. The canalization correction, along with rate

codes are known as matching, interleaving

Orthogonal Variable and transport channels

Spreading Factor (OVSF) mapping onto/splitting

codes. from physical channels

Channel Coding [10]. This section gives a

The main purpose of brief description on the

channel coding is to error detection and error

selectively introduce correction schemes

redundancy into the recommended for the

transmitted data and WCDMA systems.

improve the wireless link Error Detection

performance in the Error detection is

process[9]. Channel codes provided by a Cyclic

can be used to detect as Redundancy Check (CRC)

well as correct errors. The code. The CRC is 24,16,8

WCDMA systems have or 0 bits. The entire

provision for both error transmitted frame is used

to compute the parity bits. • Turbo Coding

Any of the following cyclic For standard services that

generator polynomials can require BER upto 10 , which is

be used to construct the the case for voice applications,

parity bits: convolution coding is to be

G (D) = D applied. The constraint length

+ D +D + D + D for the proposed convolution

+1 coding schemes is 9. Both rate

G (D) = D ½ and 1/3 convolution coding

+ D +D + D +1 has been specified. For high-

G (D) = D quality services that require BER

+ D +D + D + D from 10 to 10 , turbo coding

+1 is required. The feasibility of

A detailed description of applying 4-state Serial

the error detection Concatenated Convolution Code

scheme is given in [10]. (SCCC) is being investigated by

Error Correction different standardization bodies.

Two alternative Simulator

error correction schemes The simulator consists of

have been specified for two major subsections:

the WCDMA system. They • Uplink Simulator

are • Downlink simulator

• Convolution Coding
 This narrow pulse width means

The major differences that the multipaths would be

between them are : resolved most of the time and

1. Frame structure the transmitted signal will

2. The way Multiple encounter frequency selective

Access Interference fading. Three different types of

(MAI) is added to the multipath channel were

signal of the desired employed in the simulator. They

user are

Multiple Access Interference 1. Indoor channel

MAI is implemented by 2. Indoor to Outdoor

generating the signals for a channel

number of interfering MS within 3. Vehicular A

the system. Each interfering outdoor channel

user has its won control channel Addition of Noise

and one data application. Each The Additive White

of the interfering mobile station Gaussian Noise (AWGN) added

generates its transmitted frame at the front end of the receiver

in the same manner as the is generated by a Gaussian

desired user. random number generator. The

Time Varying Channel variance of the noise

The chip rate of the distribution depends on the

WCDMA signal is 3.84 Mcps. Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) or

at the receiver front end. The base station receiver is four.

noise variance is also a function However any number of finger

of the spreading factor, signal between three and six can be

amplitude and sampling rate chosen. The simple case of one

i.e., the number of samples per finger is also provided as an

chip. option. The block diagram

shown in Figure 3.10 illustrates

Rake Receiver the implementation of the rake

Multipath is resolved for receiver. It is assumed that the

WCDMA system because of the receiver has perfect channel

wide bandwidth. Rake receiver estimation. Maximal Ratio

[18] is used to exploit the Combining (MRC) is employed

consequent time diversity. The for rake combining [19],[20].

default number of fingers at the

Frame Z1
Alignment Resampling Descrambling Despread

Frame Z2
Alignment Resampling Descrambling Despread

Received
 ----

Frame

MRC

---

-------

Frame ZN
Alignment Resampling Descrambling Despread

Figure : Rake Receiver

Description of the Rake Receiver

When a frame is transmitted through the time varying channel, it

is multiplied with independent Rayleigh faded waveforms along each

path. These time varying waveforms are complex. The amplitude

distribution is Rayleigh and the phase distribution is uniform in the

interval[ ]. The phase associated with the Rayleigh waveform

rotates the constellation of the transmitted signal. So in the rake

receiver we cancel the rotation by multiplying the received frame in

each branch by the negative of the phase associated with that

particular path. We assume that we have perfect phase estimation so

that we can cancel out the phase in each branch.

The frame alignment block takes care of the delay associated

with each path so that we know the frame boundary at each branch.

We then reconstruct each chip from the pulse shaped signal by

sampling at the chip rate. This is performed in the Resampling block.

Descrambling is performed by multiplying the resample signal by the

complex conjugate of the desired MS specific scrambling code.

Graphic User Interface (GUI) for the Simulator

The description of the GUI for the simulator is presented in this

section. The menu driven interactive GUI includes both the uplink and
downlink simulators. For each of the simulators, the user can either
select the default values for the parameters or can provide values of
his choice. The main menu can be called by typing in the word
WCDMA at the Matlab command prompt.
Coded System

A test case of error correction coding was implemented for an

uplink voice application that has a data rate of 9.6 kbps. A rate 1/3

constraint length 9 convolution coding was employed at the

transmitter. A viterbi soft decision decoder was used at the receiver.

We did not implement any error detection scheme or interleaving with

that. The following figure shows the encoder used at the transmitter:

Conclusion and Future Work

We implemented a signal simulator according to the physical layer

specification of the IMT-2000 WCDMA system. The data is transmitted
in a frame by frame basis through a time varying channel. The
transmitted A signal is corrupted by multiple access interference. The
signal is further corrupted by AWGN at the front end of the receiver.
Simply rake diversity combining is employed at the receiver.

We investigated the bit error rate at both uplink and downlink for
two different time varying channels. As expected the system is
interference limited for higher number of users. We observed that
without any channel coding schemes and antenna diversity
techniques, the BER approaches to 10% as the system load goes
beyond 50%. This is not an acceptable performance. However the BER
can be pushed back to an acceptable limit with channel coding and
antenna diversity techniques.
 The developed simulator can be an invaluable tool to investigate
the performance of a WCDMA under various conditions. As for example
the simulator can be used to investigate antenna diversity schemes at
the receiver. The simulator is very flexible and one can very easily
make the necessary modification to incorporate complex statistical
channel model based on measurement and investigate the WCDMA
performance under practical mobile channel condition. We have shown
that it is very simple to employ the simulator to observe the
performance of error correction coding. We implemented a
convolution coding scheme for an uplink voice application of 9.6 kbps.
It was observed that channel coding could significantly lower the
required SNR for a particular BER.

Future Work
The simulator employs a simple rake receiver to exploit the gain

arising from temporal diversity. Spatial property of the multipath

environment can be another source of diversity. Adaptive antennas are

used at the receiver to take the advantage of this diversity gain. The

simulator can be used to investigate the diversity gain of different

adaptive algorithms. Space-Time rake receivers [21],[22] or 2-D rake

receivers [23] have been proposed to combine the temporal and

spatial diversity at the receiver. Transmit diversity techniques [13],

[14] at the downlink are gaining rapid popularity since they do not

incur additional hardware complexity at the mobile station. We are

investigating various transmit diversity schemes and different 2-D rake

receivers for the WCDMA system. The simulator was modified so that a
large number of frames are transmitted rather than transmitting one

frame at a time.

Turbo coding has been specified for applications that require

very low bit error rate. Turbo coding schemes can be incorporated to

the simulator in the same way we employed convolution coding.

The simulator can be further improved by using statistical

channel models based on measured data. The improvement in system

performance by using multi user detection and interference

cancellation can also be investigated.