LEARNING OUTCOMES

The Internet society is based on technological solution for continuative and pervasive connection of persons and objects (IoT). In the course, different radio technologies are investigated and compared able to guarantee such global connection, including terrestrial and satellite solutions. Radio coverage strategies will be examined by comparing different cell planning methodologies. Terrestrial mobile telephone standards like GSM/GPRS, WCDMA and LTE will be examined and compared with satellite technologies like Globalstar and Iridium. The smartphone platform will be considered as a multi-standard platform able to connect persons and things beyond the telephone network, including Wifi, Bluetooth, RFID, BLE, NFC. The added value represented by position estimation of terminal, persons and things will be considered with reference to applications for logistics, transportation and health. In such view, methodologies based on terrestrial radio fingerprinting and satellite-based global systems (GPS/Galileo/Egnos) will be introduced.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of the class students are expected to know and manage the main problems associated to radio communication either terrestrial or satellite based. They should demonstrate deep knowledge of the solutions and techniques for radio cellular coverage, terminal localization, radio resource allocation, inteference management and mobility support. They will have confidence in designing radio links by budgeting transmission power, antenna gain and propagation losses. The exam will be based on assessing the theoretical knowledge as well as the design ability. Cases studies will be investigated concerning specific applications in logistcs, transportation, industrial operation and medical assistance.

TEACHING METHODS

The class will be based on  telepresence live lessons provided through MS Teams platform.

Lessons will deal wth theoretical explanatins followed by exercise sessions.

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

Introduction on radio communications

• RF physical propagation: ground, sky and space waves
• Fresnel ellipsoids clearance
• Path loss
• Atmospheric absorption, rain attenuation
• Time dispersiveness and inter-symbolic interference (ISI)
• Slow fading (atmospheric events)
• Fast (shadowing) and very fast (multipath) fading
• Selectivity of fast fading in time, space, frequency and direction
• Transmission/reception in diversity

Pervasive radio coverage

• Center and corner-excited cells
• Cell sizing
• Overlay and layered cell patterns
• Hexagon-based cell planning
• Traffic-based cell channel assignment (B-Erlang formula, block probability, bundling factor)
• Channel borrowing policies
• Cluster planning and cell color assignment
• System interference: iso-channel and adjacent channel interference

Mobility support management

• Call area
• Signaling channel congestion management
• Traffic channel quality monitoring
• Intra and inter-cell Hand Over
• User terminal localization

Radio resource management

• Multiple assess technologies (FDMA, TDMA, CDMA)
• Duplexing technologies (FDD, TDD, CDD)
• Delay spread and Coherence Band
• Channel equalization
• Dynamic transmission power control

Global Mobile digital standards

• Terrestrial: 2G, 3G and introduction to 4G
• Satellite: Iridium and Globalstar

Global Positioning Systems

• Terrestrial technologies
• Satellite technologies: GPS, differential GPS, EGNOS

IoT technologies

• Rfid
• Bluetooth
• Visible Light communication

Context aware applications

• Case studies in automotive scenario
• Case studies in E-Health scenario

   

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

All the class subjects will be completely reported on slides and on detailed notes published on Aulaweb