Analysis of Analogue and Digital Modulation in RF

Transmitter Architecture

Themba Kaonga B422757

Academic Year 2016/2017

Abstract
The aim of this document is to investigate the implementation of modulation schemes in
modern RF radio transmitter architecture. Historically, the need for embedding baseband
low frequency information into a high frequency carrier signal by varying its attributes had
been dominated by analogue modulation stages such as AM and FM. In the current age of
radio development, digital modulation schemes (FSK, PSK) are implemented substantially in
transmitter architecture due to the ever-increasing digitalisation of wireless communication,
its faster data rate and efficiency reasons. This document will attempt to identify
conclusions for possible performance improvements alongside the current trend of
increasing digital signal processing with a view of reducing analogue circuit involvement as
well as reduction in costs and engineering resource.

Introduction
Since the introduction and subsequent adoption of Maxwell’s equations demonstrating the
physical behaviour of the general electromagnetic field, radio frequency communication has
evolved to support many of the electronic products that are prevalent today. Throughout
this, radio communication devices developed multiple novel methods of efficiently utilising
the RF spectrum to transmit and receive data such as telegraph, voice and video,
culminating in the super-fast rate digital data communication of the current internet age.
The transmission of high frequency signals was well experimented, as well as the long-
distance communication of telegraph (text) messages through this medium had been
utilised in the late 19th century. However further developing wireless communication
beyond Morse code into the more efficient concept of audio signal correspondence was
beyond the scope of the primitive spark gap transmitter technology that existed at the time.
One of the largest problems to overcome with the idea of wireless data communication was
that the human voice signals, otherwise known as of 20 Hz – 20 kHz, would require
antennae of unpractical size - 1.5 km to 1500 km – as efficient transmission requires an
antenna length of at least 1/10 of the signal wavelength.
The historical background of modulation is rat race at the beginning of the 20th century
towards effective transmission of human voice over the longest distances possible. In
particular, a scientist named Roberto Landell de Moura developed the first AM transmitter
that he called the “Wave Transmitter” that reportedly was demonstrated to transmit human
voice to a receiver 8km away.
His solution was to invent an electro-mechanical microphone that he called a phonetic
switch” to modulate the carrier. Essentially, it consisted of a diaphragm coupled to a pair of
electrical contacts inside a resonant chamber. The acoustic waves produced by a person
speaking into the phonetic switch caused a vibration of the
diaphragm at the same rate of the human voice. Then, the Figure 1: Landell’s wave
opening and closing of the contacts caused DC current transmitter
pulses to flow (from a battery) through the primary winding
of the Ruhmkorff coil [1]. The signal output from this stage
was a RF pulse train at a baseband audio frequency. This
particular process we know as transmission by Amplitude
Figure 1: Landell De Moura’s wave transmitter
Modulation (AM), a form of analogue modulation (ANM)
later popularised by Guglielmo Marconi & others, who showed its success over transatlantic
distances and acquired successful patents.

Simplest Diagram of RF Transmitter System

We establish a basic building block
model of an RF transmitter, from input
to output as:

 Source of the RF carrier (Is

modulated)
 Source of the message (is what
modulates the carrier)
 The modulation circuit or DSP Figure 2: Building blocks of an RF trnasmitter.

program
 The channel by which the resulting modulated carrier is transmitted
There are often many complex processes and circuits included in each block and, for the
purposes of this document, we will only scrutinise the “modulator” block.
2. How does Modulation Work?
Modulation is the process of transforming and translating digital or analogue signal
information up in frequency to a RF carrier signal, usually to transmit through free space to
a receiver, which then reverses the process to retrieve the original data. The wave
frequency of the carrier signal used will be the transmitter’s operating frequency.
The carrier signal used in the modulation process is almost exclusively a sinusoid waveform
due to its fundamental frequency properties. It is known by the experiments and theory of
Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier that any signal can be characterised by a composition of
sinusoid signals which have the base representation Asin(ω±θ) or equally Acos(ω±θ-90°),
where A is the signal amplitude, ω is its angular frequency and θ is the phase difference.
The decomposition process, called the Fourier series allows us to represent even complex
message signals like the human voice, as a series sum of different sinusoids.
From this it follows that the message & carrier signals will have only 3 different
characteristics:

 Amplitude (A)
 Frequency (ω)
 Phase(θ)
These are the RF carrier signal characteristics that are varied with time in proportion the
message signal’s information at that time, and therefore the components from which we
derive our modulation schemes.
This document will focus on the feasibility and performance of both analogue modulation
(ANM) digital modulation (DM) in RF transmitters. Analogue modulation being the
transmission of an analogue message via an analogue channel, and digital modulation the
transmission of digital bit streams via an analogue channel.
It is important to define the main performance goals in designing any modulation stage.
Ideally the original message will be embedded, transmitted and extracted with the highest
quality possible (limit noise & distortion effects). Secondly, due to the finite space on the RF
spectrum, the output signal should limit its bandwidth use to the smallest possible, avoiding
signal interference and conforming to strict government RF channel regulation.
Lastly, another major concern of performance will be the spectral efficiency, which refers to
the rate of information transmitted over the null-to-null bandwidth used, often measured in
units (bit/s)/Hz.

3. Analogue Modulation Schemes

Analogue Modulation is split into 2 sub-categories:

 Amplitude Modulation (AM)

 Angle Modulation (θM)
o Frequency Modulation (FM)
 o Phase Modulation (PM)

AM
Amplitude Modulation: The envelope of the output RF
signal corresponds to the amplitude of the modulating
signal, whilst the frequency doesn’t vary, i.e. is that of the
carrier signal.
In figure 3, we can see the basic blocks of an AM circuit,
Figure 3
which is derived from the AM equation described below:
x(t) = [1+m(t)]*c(t) (Equation 1)
To simplify analysis, we will use a sinusoidal message signal, m(t) of frequency, fm , to
demonstrate this scheme:
m(t) = Mcos(2πfmt + θ) (Equation 2)

where M is the modulation amplitude, which we will limit to 0 < M < 1 to avoid message
signal information loss.
We must also likewise define our high frequency carrier signal at centre frequency fc:
c(t) = Asin(2πfct) (Equation 3)

The resulting signal, x(t), from the simplified AM process can be found by multiplying the
quantity [1+ m(t)] by the carrier signal c(t):
x(t) = [1+(Mcos(2πfmt + θ))]* Mcos(2πfct + θ) (Equation 4)
We can find the result of this signal by using common trigonometric identities:
x(t) = Asin2πfct)+ MA/2[cos(2π(fc+fm)t)+ cos(2π(fc-fm)t)] (Equation 5)
This expansion of the modulated output signal leads us to draw some conclusions about the
AM process, particularly the efficiency of its use of power and the RF spectrum in order to
achieve the desired modulation effect.

AM Spectrum
The expansion in Equation 5 displays that there are 3 components to the output signal.
Firstly, the original carrier signal, as well as 2 sinewave signals at frequencies of fm either
side of the carrier frequency. These 2 sine waves are called sidebands, and are present
(alongside the carrier) in every modulated decomposition of the message signal in this
simplest form of AM, called DSB-LC.
The amount of frequency that the entire modulated signal will use is called its bandwidth
(BW). For a single decomposition of the message signal (equation 5) the total BW occupied
will be equal to the frequency of the lower sideband (fc-fm) subtracted from the frequency of
the higher sideband (fc+fm):
BW = (fc+fm)-(fc-fm) = 2fm (Equation 6)

Therefore, the total bandwidth of this

form of AM is equal to double the peak
message signal frequency. For the above
example this would be simply double the
sinusoid frequency but with more
complicated data transmissions such as
AM Voice, the bandwidth will be double
the highest frequency component in
voice, which theoretically could be 40kHz
(however in practice, the frequency
voice data tends to cap at 5kHz). This Figure 4 – Frequency Spectrum of DSB-LC showing the baseband signal on the left,
relatively small bandwidth compared to and towards the right, the carrier surrounded by both sidebands at a distance of
ωm away.
the carrier frequency is one of the major
disadvantages of modern use of DSB-AM.
Due to this over time, different implementations of the AM scheme were designed such as
SSB-AM, where band-pass filtering is used to select one of the sidebands, thereby halving
the signal bandwidth.

AM Modulation Index
We call the measure of how much the carrier signal’s amplitude has been modulated by the
message signal, the AM modulation index, im. It is defined as:
The ratio of the modulating waveform
voltage to the carrier signal voltage.
𝑀
𝑖𝑚 = (Equation 7)
𝐴

This ratio is often used as a

percentage, where m = 1 is a 100%
modulated waveform. The condition
of m > 1 is avoided because the term
[1+m(t)] < 0 be made true; as such
negative elements of the message
signal would be lost, distorting the
Figure 5 – The baseband information signal, here a sinewave in blue, and the
original signal. resulting (yellow) AM waveform centred at the RF carrier signal frequency.

As an example, the graph of the

simulated AM waveform corresponds to a modulation index of 0.7 or 70%, well within levels
used in practice.
AM Power
For sinusoidal waves of constant amplitude and frequency, the power is found by
integration over a wave cycle, given as P = V2/R. However for waves that are not sinusoidal
in nature such as the AM waveform, we can find the total average power by the sum of the
V2/R quantities of all the frequency components of the signal.
So in DSB-LC:
𝐦𝟐 𝐦𝟐 𝐦𝟐
𝑷𝒂𝒗 = 𝑷𝒄 + 𝑷𝑳𝑺𝑩 + 𝑷𝑼𝑺𝑩 = 𝑷𝒄 + ( 𝑷𝒄 ∗ 𝟒
) + (𝑷𝒄 ∗ 𝟒
) = 𝐏𝐜 (𝟏 + 𝟐
) (Equation 8)

where Pc is the carrier power and PLSB & PUSB and are the power in the lower and upper
sidebands respectively.
Deriving from equation 7, the ratio of the sideband (valuable) information power, PSB, to
wave power, Pav, can be found, the AM power efficiency:
𝐏𝑺𝑩 𝐦𝟐 /𝟐 𝐦𝟐
= 𝑷𝒄 = (Equation 9)
𝑷𝒂𝒗 𝑷𝒄 (𝟏+𝐦𝟐 /𝟐) 𝟐+𝐦𝟐

This gives us the ratio of efficiency for DSB-LC systems, and substituting 1 for m2 giving us
absolute maximum power efficiency at 100% modulation of 1/3, 33%.
Other forms of AM manage to increase this efficiency by reducing the carrier signal to low
levels by using more complex modulation circuitry to mathematically cancel the carrier
term, such as DSB-SC.

Advantages
The advantages of Amplitude Modulation stem from its relative ease of implementation.
The circuit needed to retrieve the message signal - called a demodulator – can be realised by
only a few analogue components. The envelope detector, comprised of a diode, resistor &
capacitor performs the halfwave rectifying and the RC combination follows the sinusoidal
voltage level, outputting the original waveform. This solution reduces receiver circuit cost,
significantly cuts development time and potential rework time, but however suffers from
problems in practice due to certain component characteristics.
Another well-known advantage exists with AM radio, though not discussed in depth in this
document, is that AM waves are able to refract off the ionosphere, thereby increasing signal
propagation range, allowing for international RF communication. These “sky waves” -
refracted due to their wavelength – can also be a cause of interference on the same
frequency, so are also considered a disadvantage if managed improperly.

Disadvantages
The principal issue with amplitude modulation is that due its nature, the signal information
is very susceptible to distortion from noise. As only the amplitude varies in proportion to the
message signal, any noise voltage additions will change the waveform shape of the
demodulated signal. This makes it impractical to use for message transmission where high
fidelity is a major concern such as audio distribution; the driving force for the invention of
FM radio communication, in which the output signal amplitude remains constant.
Another disadvantage can be seen from Equation 8 shows that basic amplitude modulation
offers a very low spectral power efficiency, where two-thirds of power input is wasted on a
non-information part of the signal.

FM
Frequency Modulation: The instantaneous
frequency of the carrier signal is varied in direct
proportion to the amplitude information of the
message signal. Because of the cyclical nature
of this frequency deviation, the frequency
content is embedded in the carrier signal.
Figure 6: An FM modulator
Figure 7 shows the graph of a simulated FM output signal with message signal
overlaid, the frequency of the carrier wave is varied through the message signal’s 2π cycle,
driven to max at the message signals’ peak, and to its minimum at the troughs.
Unlike AM, the output signal peak
amplitude is unaffected by FM,
i.e. it has the same maximum
amplitude as the original
message. Also dissimilar to AM,
we will find that both FM and PM
are non-linear modulation
schemes, which will have
significant consequences for the
complexity of the demodulation
process.

Figure 7: FM waveform; the output signal (yellow) has its instantaneous frequency changed
FM Spectrum from the centre frequency in accordance with the amplitude of the message signal (pink)

A modulated FM waveform has the general form:

𝐯(𝐭) = 𝐀𝐜𝐨𝐬𝛉(𝐭) (Equation 10)
Where, θ(t), the function of varying phase consists of the carrier signal, and the integral an
arbitrary modulating signal, m(t):
𝐭
𝛉(𝐭) = 𝛚𝐜 𝐭 + 𝐤 𝐟 ∫𝛕=𝟎 𝐦(𝛕)(𝐢𝐧 𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐬) (Equation 11)
The instantaneous frequency (the rate of change of phase) can be found by differentiating this
function:
𝐝𝛉(𝐭)
𝛚= = 𝛚𝐜 + 𝐤 𝐟 𝐦(𝐭) (𝐢𝐧 𝐫𝐚𝐝/𝐬) (Equation 12)
𝐝𝐭

Again, to simplify the derivation, we will use the case of a sinusoidal message signal, 𝐦(𝐭) =
𝐦 ∗ 𝐜𝐨𝐬 (𝝎𝒎 𝐭); substituting it into the above equation and integrating:
𝒌𝒇 𝒎
𝜽(𝒕) = 𝝎𝒄 𝒕 + 𝐬𝐢𝐧 𝝎𝒎 𝒕 (Equation 13)
𝝎𝒎

Where we define ∆f = k f m, and the ratio of the frequency deviation to the modulation
frequency:
∆𝜔 ∆𝑓
β= = 𝑓 , the FM modulation index (Equation 14)
𝜔𝑚 𝑚

Similar to AM, the modulation index, 𝛃,

is the measure of how much the carrier
signal’s frequency has been modulated
by the message signal.
From this we can define a more
detailed form of the FM modulated
carrier:
Figure 8: Bessel function series representation of FM wave, showing its spectral
𝐯(𝐭) = 𝐀𝐜𝐨𝐬(𝛚𝐜 𝐭 + 𝛃𝐬𝐢𝐧 𝝎𝒎 𝒕) components.
(Equation 15)
By way of a Bessel function series representation of sinusoids
as well as trigonometric manipulations, v(t) can be expressed
as an infinite series of discrete spectral components (Figure
8). From this we know that the spectrum of an RF carrier
modulated by a sinusoid of frequency fm consists of the
original carrier (whose peak amplitude doesn’t vary for a
given modulation index) and an infinite number of sidebands
at fc±nfm, n=1,2,3,…
The amplitude level of each the sidebands for each
Figure 9: Spectral components of FM wave
modulation index is different, given by the general Bessel
function, A ∗ 𝐽𝑛 (β) where the modulation index can range
from 0 to infinity.
In practice, the bandwidth requirements (theoretically
infinite) of an FM system are limited by 2 features:

1. Carson’s Rule which states the bandwidth necessary for a

frequency modulated carrier wave is the max frequency Figure 9: Frequency domain graph of FM waves
with varying modulation indices
deviation + the modulation frequency, multiplied by 2 (due to
sidebands being pairs). This rule involves an approximation that 98% of the wave power is
found in the null-to-null bandwidth.

BW = 2*(∆𝒇+𝒇𝒎 ) (Equation 16)

2. The amplitude in the higher order sidebands is very low, in general, sidebands with less
than 1% of the total amplitude can be safely ignored without harming the signal fidelity. As
such band limiting circuits such as electronic filtering can be utilised.

FM Advantages
As part of the larger comparative analysis of ANM & DM, we look to form comparisons
between AM & FM.
Firstly, we can see that a clear difference of FM is the constant nature of the wave’s peak
amplitude. This allows an FM system design to employ voltage limiting circuits to remove
noise from the received signal upon demodulation. Therefore, we can broadly consider
frequency modulation to be a noise immune scheme; FM transmitters have the luxury of
varying the frequency deviation (∆𝑓) to increase the signal-to-noise ratio of the waveform,
whereas in an AM scheme transmitted power must be increased which is a more expensive
solution
Secondly, signal strength variation in received transmission due to wave/man-made
interference is of little consequence with FM, as the embedded message signal data is not
changed by limiting the carrier wave’s amplitude.
FM has high spectral power efficiency, particularly at higher levels of the modulation index
since most of the power is contained in the sidebands, such that minimal power is lost from
use of the RF carrier wave. As previously mentioned, Carson’s rule approximates that 98% of
wave power is contained in the limited bandwidth as defined.

FM Disadvantages
FM bandwidth use is very large, particularly with Wideband FM where higher modulation
indices are used. This can impact a product design team’s scheduled work flow, as integral
properties such as the maximum modulation frequency and modulation index must be
carefully designed to keep system bandwidth within strict government and industry
regulated levels.
Due to the increased complexity of the analogue circuitry in the FM scheme, as compared to
AM, the cost and developmental time is larger.
However, despite these disadvantages, the FM scheme is generally preferred for analogue
modulation particularly where high-fidelity audio message signals are the subject of RF
transmission. It is worth noting that whilst FM disadvantages are straightforwardly
overcome to an extent, the downsides of Amplitude Modulation are such that for many
audio & video applications, it is combined with Digital Modulation schemes (such as PSK) to
be considered a viable solution.

4. Digital Modulation Schemes

Digital Modulation (DM) is theoretically less complex than its analogue counterpart, as
digital message signals will only take one of a specific number of values throughout. In its
simplest form, using the digital binary system, the message signal will simply have an
amplitude of bit value ‘0’ or ‘1’ which will vary from one to another in a periodic fashion.
Digital modulation is to allocate one of these bit values to a varying discrete parameter of
the RF carrier wave. This method is called shift keying, derived from the Morse code key
historically used for telegraph signalling.
To transmit digital data with RF waves we can vary the amplitude, frequency or phase of a
sinusoidal carrier wave and as such the main DM schemes are:
- Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)
- Frequency Shift Keying (FSK)
- Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

ASK
Amplitude Shift Keying is the process of
varying the amplitude of an analogue
carrier wave to represent the bit level of the
digital modulating signal. It is essentially a
simple digital amplitude modulation
technique
Figure 10: Simple ASK system design, where a unipolar square wave is
multiplied by the RF carrier.

The equation for ASK is as follows:

𝐱𝐀𝐒𝐊 (𝐭) = 𝐀𝐦(𝐭)𝐜𝐨𝐬(𝟐𝛑𝐟𝒄 𝐭) 𝟎 ≤ 𝐭 ≤ 𝐓𝑩 (Equation 17)
Where:
- The modulating signal m(t) = 0 or 1;
- TB is the bit duration (bit time),
- fc is the RF carrier frequency.
To demonstrate this scheme, Figure 9
shows an output example of the
simplest form of ASK, on-off keying,
where a signal representing binary 0
has zero amplitude (A = 0 ), so that the
message signal can be extracted from
only the presence or absence of the Figure 11: ASK waveform; the output signal (yellow) has amplitude varied in
carrier signal over time. accordance with the bit level of the message signal (pink)

ASK Spectrum
ASK bandwidth is given by the expression:
𝟏 𝟏 𝟐
𝑩𝑾 = (𝒇𝒄 + ) – (𝒇𝒄 − )= (Equation 18)
𝑻𝒃 𝑻𝒃 𝑻𝒃

Which is equivalent to twice the bit rate:

𝑩𝑾 = 𝟐𝒇𝒃 (Equation 18)

For an example, figure which has bit rate 5 bit/s will
have a total bandwidth of 2*5 = 10Hz (in practice this
would be an incredibly slow bit rate, real-life
bandwidths would be orders of magnitude larger).
The power in a binary ASK signal depends only on the Figure 12: Frequency spectrum showing effective
bandwidth of passband ASK waveform
wave amplitude and is defined as:
𝐴2
𝑃= Such that 𝐴 = √2𝑃 (Equation 19)
2

The energy per bit can also be calculated by the classic physical equation, W = PT in this
case, the total signal power multiplied by the bit time, which we can put in terms of
amplitude and bit transmission rate:
𝐴2
𝐸 = 𝑃𝑇𝑏 = (Equation 20)
2𝑓𝑏

Advantages
Consequently, this is one of the key advantages of ASK, demodulation of the carrier is very
simple. Generally, it requires 2 main stages to regenerate the bit stream; an envelope
detector (as in AM) and also a comparator due to the significant envelope variation from
more complicated message signal such as the human voice.
Another advantage that ASK shares with AM, it is requires less bandwidth than FM & FSK,
and is also more spectrally efficient (more power in smaller bandwidth allocation) whilst still
not very efficient in general.
Disadvantages
The principal disadvantage of ASK – and the reason it is utilised less often than its shift
keying counterparts – is its considerable susceptibility to noise interference, which changes
the amplitude - the carrier property with the embedded message signal – resulting in
corruption of the original signal.
A secondary disadvantage is the spectral inefficiency of this scheme, particularly compared
to other forms of DM, as the bandwidth use (of binary ASK) is double the bit transmission
rate: 0.5bits/s/Hz. This the absolute minimum ‘modulation speed’ for a rectangular pulse
message signal. As such BASK, (& ASK in general), is seen as an inefficient scheme that is
rarely used on its own in RF transmitter architecture.

FSK
Frequency shift keying shifts the carrier
signal between 2 different frequencies
corresponding with the bit level of the
message signal. The 2 frequencies are
called the Mark and Space frequencies,
fm and fs. The general mathematical
Figure 13: An FSK system; the inputs being 2 carrier signals at 2 separate
representation of a binary FSK modulated centre frequencies, switched in according to the level of the line coded
wave is: modulating signal

𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝟏 𝒕) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟎
𝒙𝑭𝑺𝑲 (𝐭) = { (Equation 21)
𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝟐 𝒕) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟏
Where 𝒇𝒔 = 𝒇𝟏 ; 𝒇𝒎 = 𝒇𝟐
This equation shows that the peak amplitude and phase of the carrier remain exactly the
same throughout each bit interval.
Spectrum
The frequency
spectrum of an FSK
signal is complicated
because of essentially
random switching
between 2 frequency
states. If 2(∆𝒇) =
∆𝜔
𝟐( 𝟐𝝅 ) is the frequency
difference of the 2
states, it can be shown
Figure 14: FSK waveform; the output signal (yellow) has frequency varied in accordance with the bit
that the effective level of the message signal (pink)
bandwidth use of the signal is:
2
𝐵𝑊 = 2(∆𝑓 + 𝑇 ) (Equation 22)
𝐵

Immediately we can see from this equation, that FSK bandwidth use is very high, even in the
form with the least carrier frequencies, BFSK. It is important also to note that at the very
minimum – with negligible frequency deviation – the spectrum is double that of ASK. In
practice, we find that this difference expands to 10 times the ASK bandwidth.

PSK
The final form of the most common DM
schemes, phase shift keying is performed
by varying the phase of the carrier signal to
represent the bit level of the modulating
signal.

For binary PSK, the general convention is

that binary 1 is allocated to a carrier with 0°
phase, whilst the binary 0 level is
corresponds to a carrier of 180° (π radians) Figure 15:
phase. Due to the trigonometric statement
that the cosine of π radians = -1, this is equivalent to inverting the amplitude of the ‘1’ carrier signal
when the message signal information is ‘0’.

The mathematical representation is therefore:

𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝒄 𝒕) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟏
𝒙𝑷𝑺𝑲 (𝐭) = {
𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝒄 𝒕 ± π ) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟎
Or
𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝒄 𝒕) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟏
𝒙𝑷𝑺𝑲 (𝐭) = {
−𝑨𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝒄 𝒕) 𝒃𝒊𝒏𝒂𝒓𝒚 𝟎
The clearest method for viewing this type of
modulation is by using a constellation diagram
which is a graph of the complex plane, where y-
axis is called In-Phase (I) and the x-axis is the
Quadrature (Q) axis. In digital modulation
convention, the I-axis represents modulation of
cosine waves, and the Q-axis, sine waves.

Figure 16: PSK waveform; the output signal (yellow) has phase varied in
accordance with the bit level of the message signal (pink)
We can see from the constellation graph of Figure 17, that
the PSK signals are symmetric, and as such the furthest
away from each other possible, 180 degrees, as only 2 bits
are used. This configuration is the absolute minimum
probability of bit error, and as such minimal power is
needed to guarantee bit error performance, compared to
ASK & FSK.

Spectrum
Like ASK, the effective bandwidth use of PSK modulation
can be generalised by the expression:
Figure 17
𝟏 𝟏 𝟐
𝑩𝑾 = (𝒇𝒄 + ) – (𝒇𝒄 − ) =
𝑻𝒃 𝑻𝒃 𝑻𝒃
which is twice the bit transmission rate. The null to null bandwidth use of most PSK systems
will remain the same, however more information can be transmitted over this bandwidth by
increasing the amount of carrier waveforms such as in M-PSK, where a integer M of PSK
waveforms has a M number of states, and has a phase variation of 𝟐𝝅/𝑴 radians. A
common PSK system, where M = 4, called QPSK, has 2 𝑥 2 = 4 states and an equidistant
𝟐𝝅 𝝅
phase variation of = radians or 90 degrees.
𝟒 𝟐

The power in a binary PSK signal depends only on the wave amplitude and is defined as:
𝐴2
𝑃= Such that 𝐴 = √2𝑃
2

Such that we can represent the signal as:

√2𝑃 𝒄𝒐𝒔(𝟐𝝅𝒇𝒄 𝒕 + ∅(𝒕))

Advantages
Phase Shift Keying is one of the most robust forms of modulation in general, serious
modulation & modulation errors will often only occur in the noisiest of channels. This is due
to the constant peak amplitude of the waveform as well as distinctness of the carrier phase
changes occurring when the bit stream crosses the zero-level.
BPSK, where the received bit phase is compared to the phase of the previous bit signal. BPSK
is very spectrally efficient in that you can transmit at a data rate equal to the bandwidth or 1
bit/s/Hz. This can be even further improved by the more complex PSK forms, such as QPSK
& DPSK, where the bit rates are increased over the same use of bandwidth.
Disadvantages
The proper demodulation of BPSK requires the signal to be compared to a sine carrier of the
same phase. This involves carrier recovery and other complex circuitry.

5. Comparisons & Conclusions

Radio transmitter architecture must include a careful choice of the particular circuit used in
its modulator block. In addition to the theoretical operation explored thus far, the
engineering decision must include a practical comparison of the features of modulation
schemes.
The modern RF industry has recognised the relative cost effectiveness of maintaining the
ANM infrastructure. Constant improvements have been made to combat the general noise
susceptibility of analogue data e.g by implementing angle modulation schemes first
introduced in the 1950’s. However, the ever increasing lack of RF spectrum space is starting
to dictate a move away from ANM, often employed in industries such as Air Traffic Control
(ATC) where RF transmitters such as the PARK AIR T6, use subsets of AM.
To offset this problem, reductions in channel spacing size has been considered from the
current size of 25 kHz to 8.33 kHz with the latter being slowly adopted in European air
transport industry to decrease adjacent channel interference & alleviate spectrum
allocation concerns. Nevertheless, common trends in the civil airline business suggests that
only be a matter of time till the extra channels created will also be over-allocated.
A long term solution, updating the common employment of analogue schemes in
architecture to include a combination of digital modulation and DSP is feasible, however
faces the troublesome task of replacing widespread protocols & more straightforward
receiver architecture that is often preferred in ATC.
For other industries, particularly those that were born in the digital age, DM schemes are a
very attractive alternative due to their vastly reduced spectrum use, their relative immunity
to noise interference & distortion, faster data rates and also higher security of the
transmitted information. Cost from components, as well as reduction of environmental
impact are also serious considerations from OEMs and customers in the radio industry.
It can be argued that rather than AM & FM, PM is the leading scheme of modulation,
utilised more commonly in digital form as PSK and a subset called QAM. This is mostly due
to the very high data rates over the same bandwidth that can be obtained from mapping
binary words to phase variations of the same RF carrier. It is preferred in many eminent
technologies in the 21st century such as Wi-Fi, GSM and satellite television.
Unfortunately all these advantages come at a practical cost, as digital modulation increases
the system complexity upon transmission, due to a necessity of much more signal
processing when transmitting analogue baseband information, but also demodulation
involves complicated mathematical operations as well.
Additionally, the inflexibility of DM compared to analogue modulation is shown when
baseband information is not digital in nature; a supplementary circuit block (ADC) is
necessary to sample and encode the analogue data to convert to the required bit stream
that can be used to modulate the carrier in the schemes discussed. This extra processing
step is mirrored in receiver architecture where a D-A conversion circuit is required adjacent
to the digital demodulator to retrieve the baseband signal. Nowadays, practical
implementation of these circuits is performed by an IC optimised for DSP, such that the
problem is solved with software development, limiting the analogue circuit.
Recently there has been a push towards fully digitalising RF transmitters (coined as Software
Defined Radio), which would rely heavily on data conversion to and from the analogue &
digital domains, involving significant signal processing to perform baseband conditioning,
modulation and RF up-conversion. This technology wave is mostly in the research phase as
its widespread use and implementation in the wider RF industry is impractical at the current
level of technological advancement due to development complexity. To undertake the
adoption of SDR’s as a dominant technology in radio communication will requires significant
investment in software development/personnel, scope, and schedule).

6. Recommendations
- Investigate deeper how more complex message signals affect modulation in RF
systems. Unlike this document which described modulation with easily sampled
sinusoidal modulating signals, an analysis with more complex, realistic signals will
enable an insight into the main drawback of digital modulation, the need for
analogue to digital conversion.
- Perform a more in depth study on effects of noise, in analogue modulation. In digital
modulation, studying the effect of bit errors on the fidelity of the baseband
information.
- Consider testing a combination of analogue and digital mod schemes in one solution,
perhaps for increasing data rates/spectral efficiency & decreasing cost, also potential
cybersecurity concerns.

Abbreviations
ADC – Analog-to-Digital Converter
DAC - Digital-to-Analog Converter
DSB-LC – Double Sideband-Large Carrier
DSB-SC – Double Sideband- Suppressed Carrier
DSP – Digital Signal Processing
GMSK – Gaussian Minimum Shift Keying
IC – Integrated Circuit
LSB – Lower Sideband
OEM – Original Equipment Manufacturer
RF – Radio Frequency
SDR – Software Defined Radio
SSB – Single Sideband
USB – Upper Sideband

References
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Figure 2: Razavi, B. 1998, RF Microelectronics, New Jersey, Prentice Hall

Figure 4: https://electronicspost.com/derive-an-expression-for-single-tone-amplitude-modulated-
wave-and-draw-its-frequency-spectrum/

Figure 8-9: Krauss, H.L. 1980, Solid State Radio Engineering. New York, John Wiley & Sons

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