In the discussion on sampling, the process of sampling a continuous-time signal was discussed in detail and subsequently sampling theorem was derived. In many applications, resampling an already digitized signal is mandatory for an efficient system design. In wireless communications, sample rate conversion is utilized for upconversion and downconversion to a desired frequency, filtering stages in the digital frontend and sometimes for carrier and timing synchronization during signal acquisition. See the Cascade Integrator Comb (CIC) filters for how to accomplish this task with minimal resources. In discrete domain, sample rate can be reduced by discarding intermediate samples periodically called downsampling
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Beamforming for Broadband Signals
Recall that classical or physical beamforming is based on calculating the differences in wave arrival times of a signal between antenna array elements and compensating for these delays through signal processing techniques that steer the beams in any desired direction. There are two main candidates for this purpose: Phase shifting and True Time Delays (TTD). We saw in that article on beamforming that phase shifts implemented through a set of complex multipliers are incapable of beamforming over the entire bandwidth of a signal. Why? The intuitive reason is clear from a signal level view. In the narrowband scenario, the same
Continue readingPulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM)
In the article on modulation – from numbers to signals, we said that the Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM) is an amplitude scaling of the pulse $p(nT_S)$ according to the symbol value. What happens when this process of scaling the pulse amplitude by symbols is repeated for every symbol during each interval $T_M$? Clearly, a series of bits $b$ (1010 in our initial example) can be transmitted by choosing a rectangular pulse and scaling it with appropriate symbols. \begin{equation*} \begin{aligned} m = 0 \quad b = 1 \quad a[0] = +A \\ m = 1 \quad b = 0 \quad a[1]
Continue readingSampling a Continuous-Time Signal
Most signals of our interest — wireless communication waveforms — are continuous-time as they have to travel through a real wireless channel. To process such a signal using digital signal processing techniques, the signal must be converted into a sequence of numbers. This can be done through the process of periodic sampling. From Continuous to Discrete Time Consider a band-limited continuous-time signal $s(t)$ and its frequency domain representation $S(F)$ with bandwidth $B$, shown in the above figure. A discrete-time signal $s[n]$ can be obtained by taking samples of $s(t)$ at equal intervals of $T_S$ seconds. This process is shown in
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